Bill C-11 (Historical)

Balanced Refugee Reform Act

An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act

This enactment amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, primarily in respect of the processing of refugee claims referred to the Immigration and Refugee Board. In particular, the enactment
(a) provides for the referral of a refugee claimant to an interview with an Immigration and Refugee Board official, who is to collect information and schedule a hearing before the Refugee Protection Division;
(b) provides that the members of the Refugee Protection Division are appointed in accordance with the Public Service Employment Act;
(c) provides for the coming into force, no more than two years after the day on which the enactment receives royal assent, of the provisions of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that permit a claimant to appeal a decision of the Refugee Protection Division to the Refugee Appeal Division;
(d) authorizes the Minister to designate, in accordance with the process and criteria established by the regulations certain countries, parts of countries or classes of nationals;
(e) provides clarification with respect to the type of evidence that may be put before the Refugee Appeal Division and the circumstances in which that Division may hold a hearing;
(f) prohibits a person whose claim for refugee protection has been rejected from applying for a temporary resident permit or applying to the Minister for protection if less than 12 months have passed since their claim was rejected;
(g) authorizes the Minister, in respect of applications for protection, to exempt nationals, or classes of nationals, of a country or part of a country from the 12-month prohibition;
(h) provides clarification with respect to the Minister’s authority to grant permanent resident status or an exemption from any obligations of the Act on humanitarian and compassionate grounds or on public policy grounds;
(i) limits the circumstances in which the Minister may examine requests for permanent resident status or for an exemption from any obligations of the Act on humanitarian and compassionate grounds; and
(j) enacts transitional provisions respecting the processing of pending claims by the Minister or the Immigration and Refugee Board.
The enactment also amends the Federal Courts Act to increase the number of Federal Court judges.

Immigration

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to respond to the member for Winnipeg North. Let me try to answer the last part of his question first, that being is the whole aspect of detention.

The member is correct. He and I both travelled to Vancouver, Laval and also Rexdale, Toronto, to view the detention facilities at all three of those locations.

He mentions Bill C-31. Part of the reason we actually did the tour was based on a number of witnesses called for by the official opposition, but also by his party, who came forward with respect to the study on the safety and security of our borders that the committee is currently working on. Witness after witness from the Liberal Party and the New Democratic Party came forward and made all kinds of overtures about what they felt the conditions of the detention facilities were.

I think I have the support of the member for Winnipeg North on this. We looked at all three facilities. None of the facilities are similar in nature in terms of how they are organized and run. However, I know we would both agree that the treatment of the individuals who were under detention at those facilities is far superior than any one of their witnesses was prepared to commit and admit to at committee. Therefore, I have a deep appreciation for our ability to go on the tour of these three facilities to understand what they were all about and to see the treatment of those individuals who were detained there for specific reasons.

The member mentioned the Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady. What happens about two or perhaps three times every decade is that ships come in from offshore because smugglers believe they can take advantage of the people who are on those ships. They force them to pay enormous, ridiculous amounts of money to stuff them onto these boats and then bring them to Canada because we had the reputation of having a system that was broken with respect to refugees. The ships would come here because it was believed to be so easy. The smugglers told the people on these ships to claim refugee status in Canada and that they would be automatically granted refugee status. Those people, who wouldn't have identification, were smuggled onto these ships and brought across. It was very unsafe. The member has seen these ships. He knows how unsafe they are.

I wish that when the Liberal Party was in power for 13 years and had the opportunity, it would have changed the immigration system and addressed the issue of those who are claiming refugee status here. The refugee system was broken.

Both Bill C-11 and Bill C-31 get at the very heart of what the problem is. That is that over 60% of those who apply for refugee status in Canada are either bogus claims, withdraw their claims or go back to their country of origin because they had learned that this was a system they could take advantage of.

I wish we would have had the Liberals' support at committee and with the bills that we passed in this legislature. We have Bill C-43 coming up to get rid of foreign criminals in this country. I hope the member will consider supporting that.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member knows I cannot speak to the specifics of an individual case, but the policy she speaks to in terms of how the Immigration and Refugee Board treats issues in this regard was passed under the previous Parliament under Bill C-11. Every member of Parliament and every party supported that legislation in terms of starting the process of reforming our refugee legislation.

Strengthening Military Justice in the Defence of Canada Act

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak today against the second reading stage of Bill C-15. Before my colleagues across the way start saying that I do not like the military and all of those things, I will stress that it is because I so strongly support the men and women in our military who sacrifice so much to serve our country and put themselves on the line that I find it very difficult to support this legislation. Surely, our men and women who serve us at home and overseas in unimaginable circumstances deserve due process, and that is what this is all about. It is about transparency, accountability, t doing the right thing and natural justice.

When I look at Bill C-15, I do acknowledge that the government has taken a baby step in the right direction. However, it is only a baby step and does not go far enough.

As I look at the legislation, I experience déjà vu. Not too many days ago I stood in the House and talked about another bill, Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which was legislation that the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism praised as being a miracle. It was legislation that all political parties worked on and together they included elements that would address human smuggling, put processes in place that would speed up processing times and short-term detention for people who did not have identification verification, all of those things. I want to acknowledge my colleague from Trinity—Spadina who did such an amazing job on that file. The government side and the other opposition party also praised that legislation.

Then, lo and behold, out of the blue we then had legislation that went backward and undid so much of the work that was done. Bill C-11 was the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and we ended up with Bill C-31 in its place, which undid all the work that was accomplished in Bill C-11. That is exactly the déjà vu I am experiencing now.

Once again we had legislation that was in Parliament, Bill C-11, which had been acclaimed but was still not fully implemented, and then it was undone. On the other hand, Bill C-15 undoes the amendments that were accepted in Bill C-41. Once again, we need to look at what the drive is behind this. The drive behind it seems to be the majority my colleagues are experiencing across the way. I was really hoping that after a year of being a majority government it would have gotten over that and gone on to do the work of Parliament in a way that respects the role of the opposition and, of course, the contributions the opposition has to make when it comes to legislation.

As I was saying, I was experiencing déjà vu. Here we are with this iteration of Bill C-15, and none of the compromises, amendments that were made in Bill C-41 are in it. Why? It is so tiring to hear about how the Conservatives are all about the military and how the opposition does not care about the military.

When I look at this legislation, I wonder how much my colleagues sitting across the aisle really care about the men and women who serve in our military and put their lives at risk and why the Conservatives have chosen to ignore key recommendations from a critical report written by Antonio Lamer, which was issued in 2003. There were 88 recommendations in that report. Out of those 88 recommendations, only 28 have been dealt with to date.

I am not fully blaming my colleagues across the aisle. The other opposition party also had an opportunity to implement the recommendations that were made in the Lamer report and it chose to sit on them. I do not know why, maybe it was dealing with a lot of other issues. Surely, no other issue can be as important as ensuring that the men and women who serve in our military get justice and get treated fairly.

We have all of these things going on. One good thing that I suppose we could say, as could my colleagues across the aisle, is that Bill C-41 was never acclaimed.

My colleague who spoke just before me is such an eloquent speaker. I just hope that one day in the future I can emulate even 10% of what he is able to express so clearly and so succinctly.

As my colleague said, the government had the opportunity, because the bill was at the report stage, to deal with it before Parliament was shut down for the last election. However, it chose not to.

Here we are a few days before Parliament closes and, again, through bullying tactics, we will sit until midnight every night this week. Why was the legislation not introduced earlier so we could have dealt with it? It could have gone through all the stages.

Here we are at 10:50 p.m. on the Tuesday night, before Parliament recesses on Friday, debating the treatment of our men and women who serve in the military to give them the kind of fairness that we expect as civilians. Where are the priorities of the government? Certainly not with the men and women in the military. The government seems to have other priorities.

When I looked at all of this, and I will go through this in detail, I was struck by a quote from the Minister of National Defence in February 2011, when he appeared before the Standing Committee on National Defence, the same defence minister who occupies the seat today. This is what he said when he endorsed the summary trial system:

—the summary trial system strikes the necessary balance between meeting the unique disciplinary needs of the Canadian Forces and the needs to respect the rights of individual members of our military....Canadians similarly need to know that their country's military system will treat those who serve fairly and in a way that corresponds to Canadian norms and values.

Does the minister still believe in those words? If he does believe them, why is the minister not accepting the fact that the summary trial system is tainted with undue harshness? Sentences are resulting in criminal records for minor offences. Why is the minister ignoring the need for greater reform than the baby step that is being proposed in this legislation?

When we look at all of this, we really begin to question the motives and what drives the government.

In the previous iteration last year, the NDP put forward some amendments. Quite a few were accepted. Other important amendments that were passed at committee stage at the end of the last parliamentary session are not in Bill C-15, although a couple are. The ones that are not there include the following.

First, the authority of the Chief of Defence Staff in the grievance process, responding directly to Justice Lamer's recommendation, is not included in the bill. Second, changes to the composition of the grievance committee to include a 60% civilian membership is once again not included in the bill. Third, a provision ensuring that a person who is convicted for an offence during a summary trial is not unfairly subjected to a criminal record. Once again, that is not included.

What would address some of our concerns with this legislation? We absolutely need further amendments and we need to ensure that the summary trial system is fixed. Summary trials are held without the ability of the accused to consult counsel. There are no appeals or transcripts of the trial. The bit that I find very hard, maybe because of the background I have had, where I have always believed that if people are accused of something, they have the right to representation. Then they have the right to go before a person who is fairly neutral. In this case, people end up having to go in front of one of their commanding officers. If they go before one of their commanding officers, I am not sure how independent that is and what kind of pressure that puts individuals who are there to advocate for themselves without legal counsel. This absolutely puts undue pressure on our armed forces when they can be convicted for very minor service offences.

I am sure that some members previously had employers somewhere, other than the Canadian people. Perhaps they had some kind of an accusation against them, or maybe they came to work late or whatever and before they knew it, there was a grievance. They then had to defend themselves, in other words, put their case forward. First, they could not get representation. Second, they had to go before their employers. Imagine the kind of depressing effect that has on people when they have to go in front of someone who has that much power and authority over them? That actually has a chilling effect on even the accused's desire for justice because they are afraid of the kind of impact that could have on their career and so on.

The kind of minor offences we are talking about, and I think I could often be accused of these, are: insubordination, and I think I was born with that one; normal quarrel and disturbances, almost everyone in the House would have to be charged at some time or other; absence without leave, imagine all those young people at school ending up with criminal records because they were away without leave; drunkenness and disobeying an officer's command.

This is a very serious business. I really do not want to make light of it because it actually affects our military. However, at the same time, when I am reading some of these trivial things, I am thinking that we are going to give our men and women who serve our country, without holding anything back, a criminal record for these. If they end up with a criminal record, once they are out of the army, crossing that border could become almost impossible.

I deal with cases of people who were stopped, had charges of drinking and driving even 10 years ago and were still finding it difficult to cross the border.

Is that the way we want to treat our men and women when they go looking for certain jobs? As members know, there are jobs where people deal with the public and there is a requirement for criminal record checks. If we did any of these things, as long as we were not too far out there, we would not end up with a criminal record. Military members are already held up to such high standards, so why are we, in the idea of criminality, stooping so low as to give them a criminal record? We really need to pay attention to this.

It is not easy living with a criminal record, but I will not get into that. The members know that anyway. If they have not experienced it themselves, I am sure they have had constituents who have come and talked to them about it.

Regarding reform of the grievance system, I absolutely understand grievances and I also understand accountability and transparency. Whenever we have professionals, whether the RCMP, teachers or any other profession that we hold to account, one of the key things is that civil society has engagement. Once again, this bill fails to address that. It is really critical when grievances are under review, there be a representation from civil society on the panel. This would give it that authenticity that we often talk about, and the accountability.

At this stage, I will read a quote from the Lamer report. It is quite amazing. I did not know this gentleman, but he is very learned obviously, because he gets to the heart of the matter. He writes:

Grievances involve matters such as benefits, personnel evaluation reports, postings, release from the Canadian Forces...all matters affecting the rights, privileges and other interests of CF members...unlike in other organizations, grievors do not have unions or employee associations through which to pursue their grievances...

I want to stress this. He says:

It is essential to the morale of CF members that their grievances be addressed in a fair, transparent and prompt manner.

That becomes really critical when we take a look at reforming the grievance system.

I will read a quote from Colonel Michel Drapeau, a retired colonel from the Canadian Forces and military law expert. In February 2011, before the committee, he said:

—I find it...odd that those who put their lives at risk to protect the rights of Canadians are themselves deprived of some of those charter rights when facing a summary trial. If Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and Ireland have seen fit to change the summary trial system, it begs the question: why is Canada lagging behind?

I plead with my colleagues across the way to see the light of day and please address and give fairness to our military men and women who serve us so unselfishly.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to present a petition from dozens of people in the Vancouver area calling on the Government of Canada to withdraw Bill C-31, a bill that punishes legitimate refugees and does nothing to stop human smuggling.

The petitioners point out many troubling aspects of Bill C-31, including: giving the minister the power to hand-pick which countries he thinks are safe without advice; creating two tiers of refugees based on how they arrived in Canada; a five-year mandatory wait for bona fide refugees to become permanent residents and reunite with their families, again based on how they arrive in the country; and treating 16-year-old refugee claimants as adults, including detaining them.

The petitioners call on the government to scrap Bill C-31 and implement Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act, legislation that passed just last year with the support of all parties in this House.

With the third reading vote scheduled for tonight, it is the last chance for the Conservative government to do the right thing.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am puzzled by some of the comments made by my colleague, so I have a couple of questions which I hope he can answer.

Is he aware of Bill C-11? Not only was it passed by this House but it was actually praised by the minister. Its actually known as the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. That act actually has all of the needed elements for the safety and security of Canadians. All of the features that would be required are in there.

Also, the member talked about people jumping the line. We are not talking about people arriving here on a holiday. We are talking about people who are escaping life and death situations. They are asylum seekers under the UN conventions. They are coming here in a legitimate way to escape persecution.

Is the member aware of Bill C-11 and what is in it, a bill that has not even been acted upon yet?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for his contribution at committee. We spent hours and hours, days and days, listening to witnesses and working through the bill. He was probably a little surprised that two very significant amendments were proposed by the government and were accepted. In fact, I have to thank the member. Both of the amendments put forward by the government were supported unanimously by the government, NDP and Liberal members at committee.

What we have in the bill, and it has been through the legal process in terms of understanding the designated safe country origin, is a quantitative and a qualitative analysis of how the designated safe country process would work. As good as Bill C-11 was, it lacked the accountability of how that designated safe country process was going to work. It was actually going to be in regulation. We are much more transparent in our approach to designated safe countries with Bill C-31 because the process is actually in the legislation itself.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to the bill.

Having listened closely to the previous speaker's presentation on your ruling, Mr. Speaker, I will speak to one point on the issue that relates to Bill C-31 and to Bill C-38.

There are a number of issues in Bill C-38, our budget bill, that have a lot to do with immigration. I appreciate the member's description of what the opposition's role is in terms of keeping the government to account and accountable. However, what he failed to mention was the amount of time allocated in committee for both Bill C-31 and Bill C-38. Bill C-38 was given an unprecedented amount of time for debate, more than for any other bill in recent history. The fact is that the member would not and did not acknowledge the hours and hours spent debating each and every one of these clauses at committee, which is part of the parliamentary process. He did not even want to acknowledge the time given by the government, in agreement with the opposition, to have that debate.

I have said that because we took exactly the same approach with Bill C-31. We opened the doors at committee and said that we should bring in all witnesses. The opposition members believed that this was a big, fundamental bill that would change the refugee system in our country so they wanted to hear from all the experts in the country. Even though we had gone through the entire process once already, we went through it again. I did not hear an acknowledgement from the member opposite for the efforts made in terms of our parliamentary process and listening to what people had to say, and not just witnesses but all members of the opposition who had the opportunity to present their changes, thoughts and beliefs on what the bill should look like. With respect to Bill C-31, there were two significant amendments that were made at committee. These were not amendments that had to be made. As everyone knows, there are enough votes at each of our committees here on the Hill for us to win without having to make changes, without having to do anything other than that this is what will be moved forward for third reading and this is the bill that will receive royal assent.

In our case, we heard from witnesses and we made two significant changes. One had to do with cessation. The way the clause could have been interpreted, an unintended consequence could have been the potential for that individual to lose permanent residency if the country of origin had changed status. We made adjustments to that piece of the legislation. We also made a significant change to the detention issue for irregular arrivals. The original clause included a detention period of up to 12 months. Upon hearing from experts and witnesses who presented their case, the minister and the government listened and made a significant decision. We said that individuals who arrive in what is deemed an irregular arrival, as we saw with the Sun Sea or the Ocean Lady in British Columbia, they would have a hearing after 14 days. Subsequently, if they have been determined to have or not have success with respect to their refugee application, they would be given another hearing after six months.

Therefore, contrary to what the opposition members have been saying over the last week about this government's position with respect to listening, it does listen and it has listened. Bill C-31 is a stronger bill today at third reading than when it was introduced at first reading. Contrary to what the opposition members are saying, this government does spend a lot of time listening, understanding and moving toward the best piece of legislation that we can put forward.

In fact, it speaks to our refugee system here in the country. We welcome more resettled refugees than almost any country in the world. Based on the continued implementation of Bill C-31, which encapsulates a number of pieces of Bill C-11, which was our original refugee reform act, we will have an additional 2,500 refugees per year settle into our country, which is a 20% increase.

It again shows that Canadians have always been known to be fair and compassionate. Our country has a long and proud humanitarian tradition. This bill only strengthens that tradition all the more.

However, it is safe to say that our system, and it is no secret, is also open to abuse. We see that abuse on a daily basis. We are a generous and welcoming people but we do not have tolerance for those who take unfair advantage of our country. Canadians have told us loud and clear again and again that they want a stop put to the abuse which exists within our immigration system. By introducing Bill C-31, and where we are today at third reading, we will see and have shown to those people in this country who have asked us to, that we will protect the integrity of immigration and our refugee system.

There are three main areas covered by the bill which are all interrelated.

First, Bill C-31 includes further and much needed reforms to our asylum system. While the Balanced Refugee Reform Act went a long way to reforming Canada's refugee system, further reform is absolutely necessary. The opposition likes to ask why. The answer is very simple but it cannot be found by using political rhetoric. This is all based on a very factual, necessary and purposeful argument.

We need to look at the cold, hard and indisputable facts. In 2011, Canada received a total of 5,800 refugee claims from democratic, rights respecting member countries of the European Union. That is an increase of 14% from 2010. That number is actually more than the number of claims that we receive from Africa or Asia. There is a simple problem here. The top source country for refugee claims is Hungary, which is an EU member state. Of all refugee claims in 2011, 4,400, or 18%, came from Hungary. That is up almost 50% from 2010.

What is even more telling is that in 2010, of the 2,400 claims made by Hungarian nationals, only 100 of them were actually made in countries other than Canada. They all came to Canada to make a refugee claim from one country, except 100. There is a problem here. There is an obvious issue that needs to be dealt with. It means that Canada received 2,300 claims from Hungary, which is 23 times more than any other country has received from Hungary. The fact that most gets to the core of why further refugee reform is needed is that virtually every one of these claims was abandoned, withdrawn or rejected. Refugee claimants themselves are choosing not to see their claims to completion, meaning they are not in genuine need of Canada's protection. In other words, their claims are bogus.

The reason these claims are bogus is that people are choosing to come all the way to Canada. They have a choice. There are 26 other countries right next door and most, if not all, are part of the EU. These bogus claimants come here to exploit Canada's generous asylum system because of the lucrative and expensive taxpayer funded health care, welfare and other social benefits that are allowed under the current system we have in place. In fact, these bogus claims y cost Canadian taxpayers in excess of $170 million, and that was just last year alone.

Bill C-31, protecting Canada's immigration system act, is part of our plan to restore integrity to our asylum system and restore Canadian's confidence in our immigration system. The bill would make Canada's refugee determination process faster and fairer and would result in faster protection for those who legitimately need refugee protection. It would also, and this is the important aspect of it, ensure faster removal of those whose claims are withdrawn, those claims that are bogus and those claims that have been rejected.

We will speed up the refugee claims process in a number of ways. For example, one major component of Bill C-31 is the improvements to the designated country of origin provision. This will enable the government to respond more quickly to increases in refugee claims from countries that generally do not produce refugees, such as most of those that are in the European Union. Claimants from those countries will still have the opportunity to be heard in terms of their application and to be deemed refugees in Canada.

Contrary to what the opposition has said, there is, for every person who claims refugee status in this country, an opportunity to be heard and an opportunity to have their case determined by the Immigration and Refugee Board. We will change that process so that it will take close to 45 days versus close to 1,100 days that exists now, more than on average three years to process a refugee application in this country.

If 97% or 98% of claims from particular countries are abandoned or withdrawn, we can just imagine how many months and how many years an individual can take advantage of the Canadian system just because of the number of days it takes to get through this process. This will happen no more. We will turn the system around. We will ensure that everyone gets a hearing and we will ensure it is completed within and about as close to 45 days as possible.

The designated country of origin provisions, which I mentioned and are included in Bill C-31, would bring Canada in line with its peers. Countries, like the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Switzerland, all recognize that some countries are simply safer than others and we can presume them to be so based on criteria, both quantitative and qualitative, that are included within the bill itself. Therefore, refugee claimants from those designated safe countries may be reasonably considered under the expedited process, the 45 day process that I mentioned.

We have had some discussion about the UN lately. I am encouraged, or at least listening, when the opposition stands to speak in favour of pretty much anything that the UN does. I thought it would be important this morning to show that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres, has acknowledged that by saying:

...there are indeed safe countries of origin. There are indeed countries in which there is a presumption that refugee claims will probably be not as strong as in other countries

Mr. Guterres also agreed that as long as all refugee claimants have access to some process it is completely legitimate to accelerate claims from safe countries.

I will take that one step further. Abraham Abraham, who is the former United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, also is not opposed to the process upon which we have designated safe countries. He indicated:

...as long as this is used as a procedural tool to prioritize or accelerate examination of applications in carefully circumscribed situations, and not as an absolute bar.

We are not just implementing a process that is being used everywhere in a number of countries in the world. We are using a process that is endorsed and understood to be a correct one. It does not exist in our Canadian system as it is right now.

I want to underscore, despite what the opposition has said, that every refugee claimant will continue to receive a hearing before the independent quasi-judicial Immigration and Refugee Board regardless of where he or she came from. Furthermore, every refugee claimant in Canada will have access to at least one level of appeal. These procedures exceed the requirements of both our domestic law and our international obligations.

I will add this is not the purpose nor the reason for passing the bill, but there is a financial benefit to the process in which we will now receive and determine refugee applications. We will save not just federal taxpayers, but provincial and territorial taxpayers, $1.65 billion over a five year period.

How will we use that money? The premiers, finance ministers and ministers of immigration across this country will tell us exactly how they could use that money, whether it be for settlement services, or whether it be for enhancing health care delivery. What we are offering is an opportunity for savings, an opportunity for that money to be used not to fund bogus claims, not to finance those who want to take advantage of our system, but to actually assist Canadians here in our country.

Unfortunately, what is lost in debate over the bill is what it will mean for genuine refugees who are fleeing persecution and who fear for their lives. Under Bill C-31, genuine refugees will receive Canada's much needed protection much more quickly. They will not be waiting three years in the determination process, but will be waiting as little as 45 days to know that they indeed have a home here in Canada. I cannot for the life of me understand how the NDP and the Liberals could be against that process.

Bill C-31 includes tough but fair and necessary measures to combat, deter and crack down on the criminal act of human smuggling. On this side of the House, we are not scared to face the issues of human trafficking and human smuggling. We will face them like no government in this country has before, and we will continue to do that.

Until recently, most Canadians believed that large-scale human smuggling was something that did not happen here, that it was something they just read about in the paper. They thought it only happened in other countries, for example, Australia.

That all changed in 2009 when Canada witnessed the arrival on the west coast of the MV Ocean Lady, which carried 76 migrants. It was almost as if it were a test case to see what would happen when the ship arrived, because less than one year later, the MV Sun Sea came, which held close to 500 migrants. This was not a cruise ship. This was not a ship designed to hold individuals. This was a ship designed specifically by human smugglers who take advantage of these individuals and extract as much money as they can, $30,000, $40,000, $50,000, from individuals, who end up spending most of their lives paying that money back. The smugglers would put these individuals on not much more than a freighter to come across the ocean and land here in Canada.

Just as we have new members who are seeing individuals who are not true refugee claimants come to Canada to take advantage of our system, so we have human smugglers who understand the business of smuggling and the lowest common denominator in terms of which country will accept the individuals and how to take advantage of that. Not only are they taking advantage of our country, but they are taking advantage of the individuals.

We all know the stories. On board many of these ships are criminals and terrorists from a country and the human smugglers themselves who, unbeknownst to others, are dressed as if they are also in a position to claim refugee status in our country.

That is going to change. We are going to let the world know that human smuggling is not only unacceptable in this country, but that there will be a very significant price to pay for those who want to get into this business.

We do not have to look too far back to the past number of short weeks and months to know that we are catching these individuals. They are being sought out. They are being charged and they will be convicted. That is how we will stop this business.

There are so many more parts of Bill C-31 that are critically important, whether it be human smuggling, whether it be the issue of irregular arrivals, or whether it be the system itself in terms of how long it takes. We are moving from a system that takes 1,000 days on average to answer a refugee application submitted to the minister to one in which it will take anywhere from 45 days for those who are coming from designated safe countries, versus those who are coming from non-designated safe countries. There is an appeal process in place for each one of these individuals.

There is a process in place where we are now responding to those who truly deserve to be in our country. The best part of all of this is it sets in place a process that is fair to Canadians.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I kind of wish I did not have to speak to Bill C-31 at report stage because it is a bill that we in the NDP very much oppose. We are very concerned about its passage through report stage and on to third reading.

Our colleague, the member for Newton—North Delta, has worked so hard in committee. She tried valiantly to make amendments to the bill at committee to improve it.

I will begin my remarks by reflecting on the history of the bill. It has an interesting history. There was an original bill which was amended to become Bill C-11, as a result of the Conservative government being in a minority Parliament. It was interesting that at that time there was some co-operation and collaboration to actually remove some of the worst aspects of the bill and to move forward with a bill that was more acceptable to members of Parliament. Of course, now there is a majority Conservative government and it is very disturbing to see that what the Conservatives did was rather than continue with former Bill C-11, they came back with a bill that is quite horrifying in terms of what it will do.

What I find disturbing is that when we hear the speeches from the government members, on the one hand they say that the bill is all about fairness and balance and that we are going to be treating refugees in a proper way and respecting international conventions and Canada's history around refugees. Then on the other hand, everything that comes out of the Conservatives' mouths is basically about abuse of the system.

It is the same kind of mantra we hear so much on the government's legislation around law and order, the Criminal Code and criminal justice. It is always about focusing on what the Conservatives see as abuse and changing laws in massive widespread ways that have an impact on society as a whole. It is a very disturbing pattern that we have seen with the government. It is a tactic the Conservatives use to divide people.

There are fears about people coming to Canada. People have many fears, but when we see a government deliberately playing on those fears and exploiting people's concerns, whether it is about immigration, refugees, or whatever it might be, it feels really bad. It feels like this is absolutely what we should not be doing. Our laws should be based on overall merit, objectivity and the public interest, rather than singling out abuse. We have seen that many times in the political environment. An example would be the attacks on people who are poor, who live on welfare. We call it poor-bashing, where laws are designed to basically scapegoat people on welfare when the rate of abuse is no more than for people in the financial sector who are involved in abuse. It becomes very much a class issue, a term which we do not use very often in the House. It becomes a way of singling people out, of targeting particular segments of our community by saying there are good people and bad people, there are criminals and there are victims, making that very simplistic division.

I wanted to begin that way because we see it so often in much of the legislation that is coming forward. Unfortunately, Bill C-31 is no different. It is a bill, like many other bills from the Conservative government, that confers greater power and authority on the minister.

I am the health critic for the NDP. We have seen recent changes in the health field around the Food and Drugs Act that will do the same thing for the Minister of Health. It will confer much greater power in terms of decision-making away from expert advice, away from a broader notion of public interest. It becomes much more of a partisan, and I would say ideological, decision-making process. Bill C-31 which deals with our refugee system is no different and in fact is probably worse.

There are many reasons to oppose the bill. One is that it concentrates more power in the minister's hands. For example, he would designate what are safe countries without any advice from independent experts.

Another major concern is it will restrict access to the humanitarian and compassionate consideration grounds for a refugee. This will be very problematic. It means that people will have to claim, at the beginning of the process, whether they will file for refugee status or humanitarian and compassionate grounds consideration. This will be a huge issue because people may not know at that point which avenue they will need to pursue. As it is now, people can go through the process and they can also file on humanitarian and compassionate grounds and know it is a due process on which they can rely.

The big concern is the arbitrary designation of so-called irregular arrivals and all that means, This raises huge alarm bells. I remember reading over the years what had occurred in places like Australia where it had mandatory detention and the kind of xenophobia and violent public discourse that took place as a result of that kind of government practice and legislation. Many of us feel this is something Canada now seems to be embarking upon. It is absolutely the wrong way to go.

I feel very concerned because when we have the minister making decisions without expert advice, those decisions can become very political and partisan. Yes, we are in politics, we all make political decisions, but when we deal with something as fundamental as a refugee process that is governed under international, UN and Geneva conventions, how we approach that is critical. Therefore, having the minister saying what is a safe country or saying that, for example, the European Union is not a safe country misses the complexity of our global environment.

I recently saw a film called Never Come Back, which is about the Roma in Canada. The film begins by speaking about Roma people who have settled in, particularly in the communities of Hamilton and Toronto. At the beginning, we think these are great contributors to the local society. There were people working in schools and long-term care facilities as cleaners and in pizza places and they had a soccer team. We wonder whether these people have been persecuted or are they refugees. Then the film takes us back to their home communities and we see the unbelievable persecution that the Roma had experienced, which was horrifying. It is something that is going on as neo-Nazism, xenophobia and violence against targeted minorities grow.

It is very alarming that the simplistic approach of the bill and the fact that it would give the minister so much power would possibly mean that many people who would be refugees legitimately fleeing persecution, hard-working Canadians who will make an enormous contribution to our society when they come here, would be cast aside for political reasons. We have been told that the bill is about getting at abuse. There is this heavy-handed approach at basically eliminating the possibility of many legitimate people from also coming through.

That is only a bit of what I wanted to say. However, it is another sad day that this legislation will go through. The bill has been resoundingly criticized by every major organization that deals with this issue. Even new groups, like the Canadian Doctors for Refugees in Canada, are so concerned about regulatory changes involving refugees and their health coverage. Because of that, they formed a new group and 50 of them visited the offices of elected members. We have not seen this before. I think it is because this kind of legislation will impact so many levels of our society that people who have not spoken out before are now saying they have to speak out.

We hope that possibly some of our amendments on report stage will be approved. I am skeptical about this, but nevertheless we will continue to speak out against this kind of legislation.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my distinguished colleague is referring to the terrorists and criminals that might enter Canada.

The only problem is that he clearly has not read former Bill C-11, which already prevents such individuals from entering. How can he justify new legislation to send away terrorists who are not even in Canada because they were already screened out at the gate?

Why pass legislation that simply oppresses people and incarcerates children, but does nothing to deal with terrorists because terrorists do not enter Canada?

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-31 but before I get into my speaking points, I did not have an opportunity to reply to the parliamentary secretary for natural resources but I want to put on record the very clear NDP position on this.

First, I want to acknowledge the good work done by the member for Newton—North Delta and the member for Vancouver Kingsway. The member for Newton—North Delta indicated that witness after witness at the committee meetings studying Bill C-31 told us that the legislation was fundamentally flawed, unconstitutional and that it concentrated too much power in the hands of the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

Bill C-31 would effectively punish legitimate refugees and do nothing to stop human smuggling because none of the NDP substantive amendments were adopted by the government members at committee and because MPs from all parties just passed the balanced refugee reform package in the last Parliament. The member for Newton—North Delta recommended that all clauses be deleted from this legislation. I think that is a fairly clear position from the NDP.

I also must correct the record around the member for Vancouver Kingsway. I know all members of the House at various times selectively quote from speeches and press releases, but I want to indicate that the member for Vancouver Kingsway actually said that Bill C-31 was a bill that was “...unconstitutional, violates international conventions, punishes refugees and harms Canada's long reputation as a responsible recipient of those needing protection”. That is from the website of the Canadian Council for Refugees. I think that is fairly unequivocal about the NDP position on Bill C-31.

As responsible parliamentarians, the New Democrats studied the bill very carefully. I would remind people that it is another omnibus bill, which seems to be a pattern that we are seeing from the Conservatives.They are not allowing parliamentarians to divide bills up and have thorough and considered study of each section of the bill to ensure we are not having unintended consequences and that the impact is exactly what the bill was intended to do. We have seen other examples in the House where we have had to go back and correct after the fact when we have made errors in bills that have been passed.

Bill C-31 would repeal most of the compromises from the former Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which was from the 40th Parliament. It received all party support. Again, members from the New Democrats worked very hard with other parties to ensure that it was a more balanced approach. Bill C-31 re-introduces Bill C-4, human smuggling, which targets refugees instead of the smugglers, and it introduces the collection of biometrics for temporary residents.

I do not have enough time in 10 minutes to go through all aspects of the bill but I will touch on a couple of points. The bill would concentrate more powers in the hands of the minister by allowing him or her to name safe countries and to restrict refugees from these countries. Under the former Bill C-11, this was to be done by a panel of experts, including human rights experts. It would restrict access to humanitarian and compassionate consideration. It includes a clause that would prohibit refugee claimants who have been incarcerated in their home country for over 10 years and would not allow for tribunal discretion in the case of political prisoners. One that has been pointed out in this context is Nelson Mandela who was convicted and sentenced for sabotage in the apartheid era of South Africa. Although the New Democrats agree that Canada should not accept those with a criminal background, many refugees are actually fleeing political persecution and some consideration must be given to those refugees.

The bill would allow arbitrary designation of irregular arrivals and their mandatory incarceration.

Bill C-31 re-introduces most of the provisions of Bill C-4, which were widely condemned by refugee advocates and are likely unconstitutional. It would change the Balanced Refugee Reform Act 2010 without even implementing the law as it is. That act was passed by the minority Parliament after a series of compromises led by the NDP and was set to come into effect in June 2012.

I want to emphasize a couple of key points. The bill would punish refugees and would not address the problem of human smuggling. We just passed the Balanced Refugee Reform Act last year and the Conservatives are going back on that compromise that they spoke in favour of mere months ago. The minister wants to concentrate more arbitrary power in the minister's hands to treat refugees differently depending on how they come to Canada.

There were some amendments that were considered. This was not only through the NDP but also by refugees and stakeholder groups. A couple of these amendments were to allow for initial detention review at 14 days initially and subsequently at six months, and to clarify that the government would not have the power to revoke the permanent residency of successful refugee claimants if conditions should change in their countries of origin unless it was found that they obtained their status through fraudulent means.

However, it is important to note that these amendments did not deal with a number of very serious situations: provisions that would give the minister the power to hand-pick which countries he or she thinks are safe without the advice from any independent experts; measures to deny some refugees access to the new refugee appeal division based on how they arrived; and a five-year mandatory wait for bona fide refugees to become permanent residents and reunite with their families, again based on how they arrive in the country.

A number of other serious concerns were highlighted as potentially unconstitutional or potentially in violation of our international obligations.

We are specifically talking about refugees but many of our constituency offices end up dealing with significant amounts of casework as a result of immigration, whether it be visitors visas, refugee claims or a number of other factors like that. I am dealing with two cases in my riding. One case concerns a family member who is now in Canada. The person is professional, hard-working and has been in the country for a number of years. Her sister has been applying to come to Canada as a resident. She has been on the list for seven years and she is a skilled, professional worker. We have no idea what is going to happen to her application. Despite the number of years she has been on the list, the amount of money she has paid and that she has done everything that she needed to do, she will not be able to come to Canada even though she is one of those skilled workers we are looking for. This family, which has been waiting patiently for seven years, has been thrown into turmoil.

The second case I am dealing with concerns a visitors visa. The person was born and raised in Canada and he married somebody from another country. This woman has adult children in the other country who are professionals and who have extended families and property. They just want to come here to visit mom and dad. These family members have been repeatedly denied visitors visas because they are deemed to be a threat or risk to not return, despite their very clear ties to their home country. What will happen in this case is that this Canadian family, with significant assets in this country, will sell its assets and move to the country where the woman's family lives. What we will have here is the loss of a professional and his wife who live in the country and the loss of their significant assets because the other country will welcome them with open arms. We need to look seriously at some of this processing.

In its comments on the amendments, the Canadian Council for Refugees stated:

While the CCR welcomes changes that improve protection for refugees in Canada, the majority of the CCR’s key concerns with the bill remain, including:

Provisions to designate ‘irregular arrivals’ and ’safe countries’ (also referred to as ‘designated countries of origin’) that discriminate simply because of a person’s origin or method of arrival

Speedy and inflexible timelines that prevent people from telling their stories and preparing their cases properly

A five-year ban on permanent residence applications and family reunification for “irregular arrivals” once they are recognized as refugees

Mandatory detention for some claimants

The Canadian Council for Refugees concludes:

Unfortunately, other amendments represent a step backwards with respect to restrictions for claimants from ‘safe countries’ applying for a Pre-Removal Risk Assessment (PRRA). In its original form, Bill C-31 put in place a 12-month bar; the amended version of the bill will increase this to 36 months. This change renders the PRRA ineffective.

We have an organization that works hard on behalf of refugees and it cannot support this bill. Surely the opinion of somebody who has the face-to-face knowledge from working for years with refugees should be considered.

I will close with a comment by Dr. Meb Rashid who said that as a physician who has had the privilege of working with refugee populations for over 10 years, he was deeply concerned about the impact of mandatory detention on the health status of an often overly traumatized population.

I urge all members of this House to oppose the bill.

Bill C-31—Time allocation motion

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Madam Speaker, I can. In fact, there is a very clear and compelling deadline that we are rapidly approaching which requires the rapid adoption of Bill C-31, the protecting Canada's immigration system act.

In the last Parliament, the 40th Parliament, this place adopted then Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act, that included major revisions to Canada's asylum system which are scheduled to come into force by June 29, 2012.

Since that time, we have seen the growing problem of both human smuggling and a large and growing wave of unfounded asylum claims particularly coming from the European Union. Therefore, we have concluded that it is necessary to strengthen the asylum reforms and adopt measures to combat human smuggling. That is why we have had to delay the coming into force of the balanced refugee reform act from the last Parliament. To be blunt, we are not in a position to implement the new system contemplated in Bill C-11 in the 40th Parliament. If we do not adopt this legislation, if it does not receive royal assent by June 29 of this year, a new law will come into effect that the appropriate administrative agencies, such as the IRB, are not yet ready to put in place.

I would point out to my hon. colleague that this bill has received 13 days of debate, 47.5 hours of debate and 130 speeches at second reading and report stage. It had 15 committee meetings with over 43 hours of committee study and 109 witnesses. It was preceded in a previous Parliament by Bill C-49,, which had many similar provisions including 3 days of debate, 10 hours of debate and 30 speeches.

In fact, this bill and most of its provisions have received an enormous amount of debate and consideration both in this place and at committee. There is a deadline with a great deal of urgency that we adopt this by June 29.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-31, a bill that dramatically changes the refugee system in Canada and, in my respectful view, does so for the worst.

I was our party's immigration critic when the bill was introduced some three short months ago. Following the introduction of the bill, I was inundated by ordinary Canadians and stakeholders alike who were worried and shocked about what the government was proposing.

It is no exaggeration to say that the bill is opposed by every major stakeholder group in the country. Churches, doctors, immigration lawyers, settlement service organizations, academics, refugee groups, cultural organizations and refugees themselves.

Rarely has a bill been so roundly condemned by so many. Why? Because it is readily apparent to anybody who studies this omnibus legislation that the bill is unconstitutional, punitive to refugees and will be completely ineffective in deterring human trafficking.

I am extremely disappointed to be back here at report stage after the Standing Committee on Immigration and Canadians heard many hours of very trenchant and damning testimony. I am disappointed to see that the government has ignored the recommendations of over 40 witnesses representing the full spectrum of the immigration community, who warned about the damaging and misguided effects of the bill.

I am referring to witnesses such as the Canadian Pediatric Society and psychologists who warned of the effect that mandatory detention would have on refugees who had been traumatized by persecution, violence, torture or other atrocities.

The government has ignored this testimony and is moving forward with this backward approach. Most telling, those same groups testified about the particularly damaging effect that detention had on children, whom the bill would also see in detention.

I think of the testimony of Peter Showler, Lorne Waldman and other members of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, probably the most knowledgeable group of people in the country on refugee law. Peter Showler used to be the head of the Immigration and Refugee Board. They testified that the accelerated timelines to make refugee claims would be impossible to meet in an adequate manner. In their testimony and their experience hearing cases, this would lead to mistakes and decisions not to grant asylum to bona fide refugees.

I want to pause to say this. Rarely is a mistaken decision more damaging and dangerous than a mistaken decision in a refugee determination case. To be refugees, they have to show that they have a well-founded fear of persecution. This often means they are fearing for their lives. Therefore, a wrong decision could lead to a deportation of someone back to a country where that person might face torture, persecution and death.

That has happened. In the past year there have been cases. There was a case recently of a Mexican refugee claimant denied here, sent back to Mexico, who then was murdered by her ex-husband, a police officer, whom she claimed persecuted her.

Those lawyers also spoke of the provisions for mandatory detention, arbitrary designation of irregular arrivals, denial of appeal to certain classes of refugees and ignoring the best interests of children, all of which went against our Constitution and international conventions alike. The government, unfortunately, ignored that expert testimony.

I think of the testimony of Gina Csayni from the Roma Community Centre in Toronto, who spoke of the real human rights violations and systemic discrimination in Europe. She spoke about how Roma refugees would be negatively affected by having EU countries designated as safe. She spoke about how disheartening and insulting it was to hear our Minister of Citizenship refer to them as bogus and she explained why he was wrong.

I want to pause there and say that we are all very intimately familiar with the persecution, the genocide, against the Jewish people in World War II. What is less commented upon is the fact that Roma, along with the disabled, were also targeted for their ethnicity, rounded up, tortured, medically experimented upon, detained in concentration camps and murdered simply because they were Roma.

This is not just any ethnic group. It is an ethnic group with a history of being the victims of genocide in Europe. There is absolute rock-solid evidence that Romas still face persecution, and states are unable to protect them even today.

The government ignored that testimony. In fact, it doubled down and continued to use inflammatory language referring to Roma refugees as bogus.

We heard from Chris Morrissey and Sharalyn Jordan from the Rainbow Refugee Committee and others who spoke about how the so-called safe country determination process threatened LGBTQ refugees specifically. Over 100 countries of this world have some form of legislative discrimination against the LGBTQ community, including death in some countries.

Again, the government plows forward as though these stakeholders never spoke.

Experts from Australia, a country the government likes to selectively quote from when its adopting policies it likes, testified that the draconian rules that the government was imposing to try to deter human smuggling—that is, rules that direct punitive elements at refugees—had no deterrent effect at all. Australia has adopted the same procedure that this bill would, and there has been no diminution of refugee claimants coming to the shores of Australia since it adopted those rules years ago. The government ignored that evidence.

The government did make two important changes, and it is important to point that out because it shows what an effective official opposition can do and it shows when parliamentary committees work.

Witnesses and opposition members warned about the impact of clauses 18 and 19. These clauses would allow the minister, through the IRB, to strip permanent residence status from people who had been living in Canada for many years on the basis that conditions had improved in the countries they fled.

The minister said repeatedly that this was not his intention. Actually he went much further than that. He said that the bill categorically did not have this effect. He vociferously and arrogantly derided members of Parliament and stakeholders who brought up the subject. In the end, however, he realized and acknowledged that he was wrong, that he did not understand the effect of the bill that he wrote. He has still not apologized for the vitriol and derision with which he so wrongly defended these clauses.

The other change that the government agreed to was to require a review for the mandatory detention at 14 days and at six months. This came after witnesses, including witnesses sympathetic to the government, had a consensus that this provision was blatantly unconstitutional, as the New Democrats pointed out for months.

This means that the government put forward a bill and could not find one expert in the whole country who deemed it to be charter compliant. This is shocking.

I would also point out the intransigence of the minister who insisted throughout that this bill was constitutional, repeatedly, only in the end to find out, just like the official opposition said and the stakeholders said and the legal community testified, it was not constitutional.

This change notwithstanding, experts still believe other provisions make this bill unconstitutional and we may be tied up in the courts for years figuring that out.

I want go back to the beginning and ask this question. Why this bill? Why does the government insist on going forward with the bill when many of the problems the government claimed to address were already dealt with in the previous Parliament in Bill C-11? We dealt with them when all parties, the Conservatives included, came together and passed the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. We all recognized that the refugee determination system was slow and we put forward reasonable solutions to this problem.

The minister stood in this very House and praised Bill C-11. He said that the amendments that were worked out by all parties in the House made the system faster and fairer and he called that legislation “a monumental achievement”.

When I asked the minister whether he was wrong then or wrong now, he said that he was wrong then. Well, that may be honest, but it does not inspire confidence and it raises serious questions about the real motive behind this bill.

Why would the Conservatives throw a bill in the trash can, a bill that the minister praised, and reintroduce a bill that in previously unamended form was inferior? Even the Minister of Immigration said that.

One part that still puzzles me is the minister's insistence to give himself the power to unilaterally declare a country to be safe. Under Bill C-11, designated persons still have the right of appeal to the Refugee Appeal Division. Under this legislation they do not. Under the previous legislation the minister had to consult with a panel of experts before determining a country to be safe. Under this bill he does not.

On television the minister said that he had run simulations that showed the system under the previous bill would not work. However, when I have asked for the data from these simulations, even under access to information, the minister cannot produce that information.

There is no need for this bill. Canadians know it. The official opposition knows it. The immigration community knows it. The government should withdraw the bill now before serious damage is done to refugees and Canada's reputation as a compassionate country.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague raised the concept of designated safe countries, where the minister can select a country and designate it as safe. The result of that is refugee claimants from that country would have certain rights denied them, like the right to appeal to the refugee appeal division.

In Bill C-11, which preceded this bill, the minister agreed to the concept of having an independent commission made up of a couple of human rights experts who would also have to agree on the minister's decision. The minister himself said that this made the process more transparent and accountable, yet in Bill C-31 the minister has taken that out.

Could the member explain why the Minister of Immigration does not want to have an independent panel as a protection to ensure that a designated safe country is proper instead of leaving that decision solely to a minister of the crown with no independent oversight? Why is that?

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the NDP believes that Bill C-11 actually did much of what we are trying to do here, and in terms of the human smuggling portion of the bill, punishing the victims is not the way to go.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of the good residents of York South—Weston, my constituents, to try to make some sense out of what is happening but I am afraid I am not able to make sense of it.

A bill has already been passed by Parliament to do what the Conservatives have been saying these past many months, since Bill C-4 and now Bill C-31 have come before us. Bill C-11 will take effect. For whatever reason, its implementation was delayed until June of this year, but it will take effect and it will solve the problem of 95% of refugee claimants from some European countries actually abandoning their claims because the provisions in Bill C-11 do precisely what the government says Bill C-31 would do. Therefore, what is the purpose of Bill C-31? It is really to put more control in the hands of the minister by making the minister solely responsible for determining which countries are safe and which are not.

That leads one to speculate wildly about what possible reason it could have for putting such control in the hands of the minister. We could speculate that it might have to do with the Department of Foreign Affairs or with giving favoured nation status in return for trade agreements. I have no idea. The problem is that we are rushing ahead with a bill that does the same thing as another bill already does. When we examine the difference, it is that the minister would have the power. It does not make sense. The portion of the bill that is new is the part that supposedly deals with human smuggling.

I was listening today to the U.S. ambassador, Luis CdeBaca, who is the head of the U.S. task force on human trafficking. So as we do not get confused, human trafficking and human smuggling are two different things. Human trafficking is engaging in slavery practices in other countries in the world and in countries close to home. What he said made me realize that had the kinds of things the Conservatives are proposing here been in place years ago, they would have prevented the praise that the U.S. ambassador gave us this afternoon.

He said that he was proud of the fact that Canada was one of the very first countries to abolish slavery. In fact, Canada accepted refugees from none other than the United States. Those refugees came to my former hometown of Windsor through the underground railroad. If this law had been in place, who knows what would have happened to those individuals who are now the ancestors of many prosperous and well-deserving families of this country, some in my riding? Those individuals could possibly have been detained in jails for up to a year and prevented from supporting or sponsoring their families. It beggars belief to imagine a regimen similar to what is being proposed by the government to deal with a supposed irregular arrival problem by detaining refugees.

We have heard the government say over and over again that it is on the side of the victims. This is making victims pay. These individuals are the victims of a crime. That crime is perpetrated by the smugglers and yet the government's reaction is to punish the victims. They are the only people it can get its hands on, because the smugglers have long gone, so it punishes them.

I have heard the Minister of Justice suggest that once people know that Canada's laws are such that it is not welcoming and victims will be punished, it will dry up the supply. It is a supply side economics argument, which we have heard a lot from the government, that it will dry up the supply of potential victims of crime.

The problem with that is that there are not a lot of Canadians who read the Criminal Code before they commit a crime, and I doubt very much that there are a lot of people in Somalia, Sri Lanka, or wherever these people come from, who have an opportunity to read Canada's immigration legislation to determine that they will go to jail if they pay someone $10,000 to bring their family over to Canada. That is just not going to happen. We do not publish our legislation in all the languages that might be spoken in these countries either. It is just strange.

In addition to those victims being punished, the minister is suggesting that we will not have to worry because the government will deal with refugee claimants from countries that he has designated as safe countries—he or she, depending on who the minister might be. The minister will determine which countries are safe, and people from those countries will be booted out of this country really fast if they are not true refugees. How do we determine whether they are true refugees? We do that by giving them a chance to plead their case within 14 days. They then have no access to appeal and no access to the refugee appeal division.

There are in fact two classes of refugees. There is a class of refugees who come from countries that the minister has not designated, and we do not know which countries those are yet, and there is a class of refugees who are legitimate refugees in every sense of the word, but who come from countries that the minister designates as safe. They, therefore, would have only one kick to get their suggestion that they are refugees before a tribunal and they have no access to the refugee appeal division. The minister has stated on several occasions that they could file an application in Federal Court. The trouble is that they will be deported long before an application in the Federal Court goes anywhere.

The other thing that bothers me about the attitude of the government toward the whole refugee system is that the minister has suggested on several occasions that he is upset that refugees skip over other countries before they come to Canada, that they should go somewhere else, that they should not come to Canada. I am proud of the fact that they want to come to Canada. We all should be proud that we have such a welcoming and such a wonderful mélange of all the countries of the world that people feel comfortable in coming to Canada. We should not force refugees to go somewhere else simply because they happen to pass by another country on the way. That smacks of a being reluctant to take refugees in the first place, although I know that possibly is not what the minister meant.

The minister also talked about jumping the queue. He does not want refugee claimants to be in a position to jump the queue ahead of legitimate immigrant applicants. He has now created the biggest immigrant queue-jump in the history of this country by eliminating what might be 300,000, and I am not sure of the exact number, legitimate applications for immigration to this country with the stroke of a pen and putting everyone else ahead of those people. Every other applicant to this country would now jump the queue if they applied post-2008, or whatever the year was that it was changed. Those individuals have jumped the queue and the rest must start again. That is so wrong, yet the minister says that he does not like queue-jumpers. He is talking out of both sides of his mouth.

The other issue that covers this whole immigration thing is the issue of temporary foreign workers. It is another example of the doublespeak we get from the government about how it wants to welcome refugees and welcome new Canadians, but we will now have a situation where temporary foreign workers are being allowed into this country and will be paid 15% less than everybody else. That will drive down wages. The minister says that it is only for those jobs where we have a shortage. We know there are jobs out there. Airline pilots are being brought in as temporary foreign workers. There is no shortage of airline pilots in this country, but we have companies bringing airline pilots to this country as temporary foreign workers, and now they can pay them 15% less. That is just going to drive down wages in this country.

Those are the kinds of immigration policies that we do not agree with, including this bill.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, a lot has been said by the government, in particular about this problem of 95% of the refugee claimants from European countries not bothering to come for their hearings. That is what Bill C-11, in the previous Parliament, was supposed to fix, and will fix as of June of this year.

With the exception of giving the minister the power to determine which countries are safe, why are we in a rush to do what will actually be fixed if we just let the law we passed some time ago take place? What is so urgent, when we have a law coming into place to do exactly what the government says this bill was supposed to do?

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to stand today to add my voice in opposition to this legislation, the anti-refugee bill, and in support of the NDP amendments.

As New Democrats, we oppose the bill because we will not support the punishment of asylum seekers, and that is exactly what the bill would do.

We also believe the Conservative government should change the title of the bill to “the punishing refugees act”. The title of the bill should reflect the nature of its content. If we are to be honest with Canadians, we need to tell them what the minister is doing and the true direction we are headed under the government.

Canadians are proud of our country's tradition of providing protection for those in need. With the passing of Bill C-31, the Conservative government will effectively be killing this tradition.

For over two weeks, the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration heard from witnesses who spoke on the content of Bill C-31. Witness after witness told us this legislation was fundamentally flawed, unconstitutional and concentrated too much power in the hands of one minister.

The well-informed opinion of these witnesses should not be taken lightly. We are talking about witnesses representing Amnesty International, the Canadian Bar Association, the Canadian Council for Refugees, the Canada Research Chair in Global Migration Studies and front-line workers who provide legal, medical and psychological support to people who have fled persecution. These are experts in this field. They know far more about this topic than many in this room. Therefore, their testimony should be taken seriously and simply not ignored, which is exactly what the government is currently doing.

As I stand in the House, a key component of our highly respected democracy, with plush carpets and clean water, food to eat, peace in our country, I am reminded that elsewhere in the country and around the world people are not so lucky.

Right now, at this very moment, people are being persecuted, are experiencing discrimination, are living through conflict, public unrest and general instability, and some are forced to make the decision to flee the only home they have ever known, fleeing for their lives and the lives of their loved ones.

People flee their country because they are desperate and they have no other option if they want to ensure the safety of their families. However, with the passing of Bill C-31, if they come to our country as asylum seekers, much like my father did, depending on their means of arrival and undefined number of people they arrive with, instead of being treated like human beings they will be treated like criminals, treated as guilty until proven innocent. We all know that is not the Canadian standard.

The bill would punish victims of persecution and victims of human smuggling. It would punish those who, because of a lack of money or option, would do whatever it takes to keep their families safe. I ask my colleagues in the House to empathize and put themselves in their situation. I ask them to think for a moment of what they would do to keep their partner, their children, their mother, their grandmother safe. If they needed to, would they run, flee the country that was unsafe through any means?

The Conservatives refuse to accept that our system currently works. We already capture the real criminals and deport them. The sentence for human smuggling is already the most punitive it can be in our country, life in prison and a fine of $1 million, yet we continuously hear members opposite saying that we need to take away the rights of victim in order to catch the human smugglers. The bill would do nothing to catch human smugglers. It would punish refugees and refugee claimants and not the human smugglers.

Instead of targeting the illegal smuggling rings, the Conservatives would rather arbitrarily designate some refugees as “irregular arrivals” and incarcerate all of them. Now, upon arrival, designated refugees will be held in provincial jails, handcuffed and treated like prisoners, with minimal review.

New Democrats are opposed to the measures in the bill precisely because Canada will now be known for punishing the most vulnerable and traumatized people in the world.

My constituents are concerned. Some of the refugees who were on the MV Sun Sea and Ocean Lady live in my riding of Scarborough-Rouge River. They have been given refugee protection by our government. They are making a home in our neighbourhoods, contributing to our economy and giving back to our community.

As the designated foreign national category is retroactive to 2009, these valuable members of our community who came on these two migrant vessels, along with future so-called irregular arrivals, will now be treated as second-class citizens under the new two-tier refugee treatment system that will be created.

Under the bill they, and all so-called designated refugees, would be barred from applying for permanent residence for five years. This is different from all other refugees, who are allowed to apply for permanent residency immediately. The bar would prevent families from reuniting for five years and further as they went through the already lengthy sponsorship system.

We are separating children from their parents. If fathers or mothers flee their country to make way for their children, they would now be separated from their families for a minimum of at least seven years. Children who are 13 will be young adults by the time they would see their mother and father again. Formative years of their life will be lived spent away from their parents.

Further, by the time their parents would be eligible to actually sponsor them, the children may not qualify as dependents anymore, meaning that they will now be forced to live permanently separated from their parents and parents separated from their children.

We could have made the bill better. New Democrats proposed concrete changes to the bill. It was a disappointment to the witnesses, the stakeholders and all involved when all of these good propositions that would have provided improvements to the bill were opposed by the government time and time again.

While baby steps were taken, none of the NDP's substantive amendments were adopted by the government members in the committee.

New Democrats have a better solution to our refugee and immigration system. In fact, just last year, all parties compromised to pass Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. That bill was applauded by our current Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism.

Bill C-31, however, ignores these compromises and includes all of the worst parts of the former Bill C-11.

What is worse is that Bill C-31 will pass before we will even have the chance to see the outcome of the changes included in Bill C-31. The government has not even allowed for the changes to take place.

One of the most troublesome measures that the Conservatives refused to revise is impossibly tight timelines for submitting an application to the Immigration and Refugee Board. The refugee system is being set up to fail. The asylum seekers are being set up to fail.

Witness after witness, including the Conservatives' own witnesses, said that these timelines were too short, that they would create incomplete and inaccurate applications. On top of that, some refugees would be refused the right to appeal their application.

We all know, unfortunately, that mistakes can be made at the IRB. The board is not perfect. With cuts to its budget and limited resources to hire adjudicators, the likelihood that mistakes will occur would be even greater. New information could come to light after an expedited claim is mistakenly processed. Without access to an appeal, this information may never be heard.

The consequences of these decisions could truly mean life or death.

Banning access to an appeal for some claimants undermines the international obligations to refugees.

A further dangerous consequence of the bill is that the power to designate a country as safe for all is concentrated solely in the hands of the minister. No country is truly safe. A country that may be safe for some residents may be unsafe for other residents.

Impartiality toward the development and maintenance of this list is extremely important. It is confusing why Bill C-31 would remove the safeguard of having a panel of experts maintain and review this list, as was decreed in Bill C-11 .

We have earned a gold standard on how we treat refugees fleeing persecution in the world. The current government is tarnishing our earned reputation. The Conservatives' changes to the refugee and immigration system will erode Canada's humanitarian reputation around the world.

I cannot support the bill and the move to a discriminatory refugee and immigration system. I cannot support the punishment of asylum seekers and refugees. That is why I oppose the bill and support the amendments put forward by the NDP.

The government needs to abandon the legislation and go back to the drawing board.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to continue the debate on Bill C-31, the Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act.

Canada and the government are proud of our tradition of being a country of openness to newcomers and a place of protection for refugees. Indeed, since the government came into office in 2006 we have maintained the highest sustained levels of immigration in Canadian history, admitting on average over 250,000 new permanent residents each year, and maintaining the world's strongest tradition of refugee protection.

We are increasing by some 20% the number of resettled refugees that we accept, increasing the integration support that they receive, so that Canada will receive the highest per capita number of resettled refugees in the world. Of course, we also have a generous refugee asylum determination system to ensure that foreigners who come to Canada who have a well-founded fear of persecution are not returned to face danger.

However, this bill is a necessary part of our efforts to protect the openness and generosity of our immigration and refugee protection systems against those who would seek to abuse Canada's generosity, more specifically, through commercial and dangerous human smuggling operations, fake asylum claims, large numbers of which are in our asylum system, and other efforts to subvert the integrity of our immigration system and the consistent application of its fair rules.

I would like to commend the members of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration on their diligent work and their many hours of hearings on Bill C-31. They heard from dozens of witnesses and diligently considered amendments to the bill.

The members who were in the House in the previous Parliament will remember that we passed Bill C-11, which set out a balanced refugee system. They will also remember that, at that time, the government and the opposition agreed to make certain amendments to the bill to ensure that it was balanced or, in other words, to make sure that the system was quick, effective and fair. At that time, we were happy with the results of that legislative effort.

However, since June 2010, there has been a huge increase in bogus refugee claims in Canada, particularly by EU nationals.

Indeed, last year, we received close to 6,000 refugee claims from EU nationals, which is more than the number of claims we receive from Africa or Asia. Almost none of these European refugee claimants attend their hearings before the Immigration and Refugee Board, and according to our fair and legal system, almost none of them are legitimate refugees.

That is one of the reasons why we need to strengthen the integrity of our system to really discourage bogus refugee claimants from coming to Canada and abusing our country's generosity. Processing these fake claims costs Canadian taxpayers approximately $50,000. These are the objectives of Bill C-31.

Further to the statements made by members of Parliament, including opposition members, and by some witnesses who appeared before the parliamentary committee, the government considered any reasonable amendments to create a better bill that meets its objectives of combatting human smuggling more effectively, preventing bogus refugee claims and strengthening the security of our system.

Let me review briefly some of the amendments that were adopted at committee.

First, one such amendment relates to clause 19. Clause 19 provides for the automatic loss of permanent resident status if an individual loses protected person status as a result of cessation.

Cessation means that the Immigration and Refugee Board, I emphasize the IRB, not the minister, can take away someone's refugee status if it is proven that the person no longer needs protection. It has always been in IRPA, the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, since it became law in 2002.

Since we introduced Bill C-31, we have heard concerns that an improvement of the conditions in someone's country of origin could result in the automatic loss of an individual's permanent resident status by a decision of the IRB, regardless of how long they have been a permanent resident in Canada.

Some have worried that Canada was moving toward a conditional permanent residence situation for refugees, which I should point out is not unusual in other democratic countries. The United Kingdom and Germany, for example, do not grant immediate permanent residency for protected people. However, this was never the intention of the bill.

To clarify our intentions, we moved an amendment at committee that one automatic cessation ground be removed from clause 19. The cessation ground we are removing reads as follows:

the reasons for which the person sought refugee status have ceased to exist.

The effect of this amendment is that cessation for these reasons, such as a change in country conditions, would not result in automatic loss of permanent residency. This would ensure that permanent resident status is lost automatically only when the cessation decision of the IRB is the result of the individual's own actions.

For example, if people come to Canada, make an asylum claim that is accepted by the IRB, but shortly after receiving such status, they return to live in the country of origin, which they allegedly fled due to fear of persecution, we would reserve the right under IRPA to go before the IRB to say that it appears they never needed our protection because they have immediately re-availed themselves of their country of origin. Therefore we could commence proceedings of the IRB to seek an order to cease their protected person status and revoke their permanent residency, but that would only be if they have done something to demonstrate essentially that they defrauded our asylum system.

The government also moved an amendment that relates to pre-removal risk assessments, also known as PRRAs. When failed refugee claimants are given removal orders from Canada, they can under certain conditions apply for a PRRA, which would trigger a review to make certain that the failed claimants are not being removed into situations where they might face a risk of persecution, torture, cruel and unusual punishment or loss of life.

In its original form, Bill C-31 called for a one-year ban for failed refugee claimants, including those from countries that generally do not produce refugees, which I might add, is a phrase used by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

This measure was intended to simplify the refugee system, eliminate duplication and expedite the removal of failed refugee claimants. The government proposed an amendment that extended this ban to three years for failed refugee claimants from countries that generally do not produce refugees.

The extension of the bar for these claimants is aimed at addressing existing process vulnerabilities that lead to misuse by those who are not in need of protection. It would facilitate the removals of those individuals not in need of Canada's protection, without the requirement to conduct a redundant second risk assessment.

Since the extension of the bar on PRRA would apply only to failed claimants from countries known to not normally produce refugees and generally considered safe, which countries, by the way, based on our proposed guidelines, would see at least three-quarters of asylum claims being rejected, abandoned or withdrawn, there is already a minimal likelihood of returning someone to a situation of risk.

It should also be noted that each eligible claimant would have received a hearing on the merits of his or her case before an independent decision-maker at the quasi-judicial IRB, which decision-maker would have rejected the claim and found no risk in returning the claimant.

In addition, the legislation would provide the minister with the ability to exempt someone from the bar on PRRA, either the one-year bar for most failed claimants or the three-year bar on PRRA for failed claimants from designated countries. That is to say, for example, that if there were to be a major event, say, a coup d'état or civil war in a country, the minister could exempt failed claimants from that country from the PRRA bar, allowing them to in fact apply for and receive a second risk assessment. It is also important to note that this amendment does not preclude a failed refugee claimant from continuing to seek leave to the Federal Court for judicial review of a negative decision of the refugee protection division of the IRB.

Some of the measures in Bill C-31 that received the most feedback from parliamentarians and members of the public were those that concerned the mandatory detention of foreign nationals who arrive in Canada as part of a designated irregular arrival, which effectively would be a large-scale human smuggling voyage. These measures, of course, were part of the section of the bill designed to deal with human smuggling.

This amendment would allow for a detention review by the immigration division of the IRB on the detention of a smuggled migrant in a designated arrival initially at 14 days prior to the detention and then subsequently at 6 months, rather than the 12 months that had originally been proposed in the bill.

I would like to once again thank all the members for their important work in committee. I am eager for all the amendments to be accepted here in the House.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, for two weeks in a row, we heard testimony from experts, front-line workers and refugees who came to express their concerns about Bill C-31 while it was being studied by the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration. I want to remind the House that a policy without justice is an inadequate policy. Bill C-31 completely jeopardizes refugee rights, and creates two classes of refugees.

The NDP does not support Bill C-31. The Conservatives should withdraw it so that the new Balanced Refugee Reform Act can work. Never before have the rights of refugees been as threatened as they are under the Conservatives. Never has our democracy been as discredited as it has been under the Conservative government, which is incapable of respecting the compromises consensually agreed upon with the other parties.

The government is unable to remember that the ratification of international refugee or human rights conventions requires us to make our legislation and policies consistent with the provisions of the international conventions we have signed. The experts who spoke to us reminded us that Canada is a signatory to the 1951 Geneva Convention on Refugees. They feel that Bill C-31 protecting Canada's immigration system act respects neither the letter nor the spirit of the convention.

Let us first recall that Bill C-31 is an omnibus bill to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, unfortunately by incorporating into Bill C-4 the most unreasonable provisions of former Bill C-11, which received royal assent in June 2010. This bill raises serious concerns in addition to those already raised by Bill C-4, the unconstitutional nature of which we have raised and highlighted in our previous interventions. All the witnesses we heard during the committee's study of the bill agreed unanimously.

I would like to draw the attention of the House to some of the concerns with this bill, both in terms of the Canadian charter and the 1951 Geneva Convention on Refugees. In response to Bill C-31, the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers has said that, like the sorry Bill C-10, Bill C-31 is extremely complicated.

The most draconian measures in Bill C-4 have again been made part of Bill C-31. Take automatic and mandatory detention, for example. Bill C-4 proposed mandatory detention for one year for people fleeing persecution in their country of origin and entering Canada without identity documents in their possession.

Clearly, the safety of Canadians is a priority for the NDP. That is why the current immigration legislation provides for detaining foreign nationals when their identity is not known, when they might run away, and especially when public safety is at risk. So we can see how the provisions on detention found in Bill C-4, which are being reintroduced in Bill C-31 are a direct violation of our Constitution.

Furthermore, the jurisprudence constante of the Supreme Court is categorical in this regard. The Barreau du Québec, the Canadian Bar Association, the Young Bar Association of Montreal and other legal experts who gave testimony were categorical about the unconstitutional nature of detention under Bill C-31, and specifically the detention of children.

The 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child prohibits the detention of children and defines a child as a human being under 18 years of age. We are asking that the age of the child be consistent with the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Finally, the experts whom we have heard from in committee have hammered away at the point that the detention of children is prohibited because it is detrimental to them psychologically, mentally and physiologically, and to society as a whole. For example, Australia had introduced mandatory detention for asylum seekers, but it had to backtrack, because, not only did detention cause costs to skyrocket, but it also destroyed the fabric of society and communities.

Why are the Conservatives attempting to put themselves above the rule of law, which is a key principle of our democracy, even though they know what our highest court said about detention in the Charkaoui case? Why are they asking the House to pass a bill that we know will be subject to court challenges, as a number of experts reminded us?

Why are they attempting to mislead the House by proposing that it pass laws that they know violate not only our Constitution, but also the Canadian charter and human rights conventions that our country has signed? Pacta sunt servanda is a principle of international law. Signed conventions have to be respected.

There are also deadlines that violate a principle of natural justice. Lawyers specializing in refugee rights have said that they are deeply troubled by the short time frames that Bill C-31 gives refugee claimants to seek Canada's protection. They find that Bill C-31 drastically changes Canada's refugee protection system and makes it unfair.

Bill C-31 imposes unrealistic time frames and unattainable deadlines on refugee claimants and uses the claimants' inability to meet those deadlines to exclude them from protection.

In fact, under the terms of Bill C-31, refugee claimants have only 15 days to overcome the trauma of persecution, find a lawyer to help them, gather the documentary evidence to support their allegations, and obtain proof of identity from their country.

If their application is dismissed, refugee claimants would have 15 days within which to file an appeal under Bill C-31. As anyone can see, the deadlines imposed on refugee claimants do not allow them to make a full response and defence.

Under our justice system, the greater the risk to life, the longer the time frame accorded to the person being tried to prepare his defence. Bill C-31 does not respect this principle of fundamental justice. A number of witnesses pointed this out to us.

I am also deeply concerned not only about the new term—designated country of origin—that Bill C-31 introduces into our legislation but also about the undemocratic nature of the process for designating the countries in question. Under Bill C-31, the minister alone has the power to designate safe countries of origin, without first defining the designation criteria for these countries that refugees may come from.

According to the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, the designated safe country list and the unilateral power granted to the minister dangerously politicize Canada's refugee system.

Refugee claimants who are on a designated safe country list have even less time to submit their written arguments and will not be allowed an appeal.

Bill C-31 also relieves the minister of the obligation of justifying why a country is safe or considering the differential risks that certain minorities face in a country that is safe for other people.

If Bill C-31 is passed, refugees will become more vulnerable because their fate will depend on the political whims of the minister and the government. Failed claimants from designated countries of origin can be deported from Canada almost immediately, even if they have requested a judicial review of the decision. In other words, a person can be deported before his case is heard.

The Geneva convention stipulates that the personal fears of victims of persecution are to be taken into consideration. Nowhere does it say that international protection is given to victims of persecution because of the country in which the persecution occurred, or whether or not the victim used clandestine means to reach a state that is a party to the convention.

It is not only in undemocratic countries that religious minorities are persecuted. Discrimination based on sexual orientation is not restricted to undemocratic countries. Persecution based on race can occur in any country in the world. All member states of the European Convention on Human Rights are democratic countries. But the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights is replete with decisions condemning democratic states for their abuse of individuals.

The government has frequently invoked the UNHCR's favourable opinion of the safe countries of origin list.

I would like to conclude by mentioning my final concern about the changes being made by Bill C-31 with respect to applications on humanitarian grounds. These applications are a tool that allow individuals to remain in Canada, even if they are not eligible for other reasons. Unfortunately, under Bill C-31, applicants awaiting a decision from the Refugee Appeal Division cannot simultaneously submit an application on humanitarian grounds.

I would like to point out that our country has always been in the forefront where basic human rights are concerned.

The refugee problem is a human rights problem and, since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, all people are acknowledged to have these rights, whatever their race, religion, political beliefs or lifestyle.

Asylum seekers are above all human beings. They are to be treated with respect, humanity and dignity. More than anything else, they fall into the category of vulnerable people who need our compassion and our protection. What is involved here is universal human justice.

This bill and these universal values are poles apart. That is why Bill C-31 should be rejected.

Motions in Amendment

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am certainly not going to give the member that kind of guarantee. What I will do, though, is identify the fact that he talked about a two-tiered system.

We, on this side of the House, do not believe that UN-sanctioned refugees who have been living in squalor and who have been waiting for years, in some cases over a decade, to find out where they will start their new lives and who have already been declared refugees, should, in any way, shape or form, be superseded by irregular arrivals who are claiming refugee status in Canada.

What Bill C-31 would do, and what Bill C-11 did, is it would eliminate the potential of a two-tired system.

We need to ensure that all those individuals who have already received refugee status get their opportunity for a new life in Canada. Those are the individuals who deserve to get here quickly. Those are the individuals we have committed to.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I appreciate the question, Mr. Speaker, because it gives me the opportunity to identify that 80% to 85% of what was in Bill C-11 has been carried forward to Bill C-31.

One of the reasons we introduced this legislation is that the process, even under Bill C-11, would take an extremely long period of time to work through. The minister, the government and the department identified that an opportunity to move forward and expedite the process through which a refugee claimant could make a claim to become a refugee here in Canada would actually speed up that process. , Bill C-31 would give an individual or a family who is applying to become a refugee here in Canada a much quicker process.

Therefore, even if those individuals are in detention during that period of time, they would now have two opportunities for a review of their file. We believe that before that second review takes place in six months, we will have made the identification and will have determined whether the individual is a claimant who has been denied or a claimant who is a true refugee here in the country.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Yes, absolutely. I recommend not putting any sort of time limit in terms of what might happen in third reading. We should try to allow for full and open debate.

I say that, Mr. Chair, because when we look at the title of the bill, it is very clear. The idea behind it was to try to improve the system. Based on that, I would argue that ultimately this bill attempts to deal with a crisis that really does not exist.

I say that because this bill can be broken into three parts, if I can generalize it very briefly.

One of them deals with the whole concept of speeding things up for the refugees. I believe that everyone inside this room and all of the witnesses who came before the committee recognize that the current system needs to be sped up. It's better for the refugees and the taxpayers. It's better for everyone. We recognized that a couple of years back. That's why we had Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. That bill did receive good, solid support, and it dealt with the issue of speeding up the process.

The second thing was for the minister to deal with human smuggling. This bill takes into account Bill C-11 and Bill C-4. You'll recall, Mr. Chair, that Bill C-4 is still on the order paper. It's all about the Sun Sea, the Ocean Lady, and human smuggling. I often make reference to the picture of the Minister of Immigration and the Prime Minister standing on the back of I think the Ocean Lady, but it might have been the Sun Sea, trying to highlight this “crisis”. The reality is that the system wasn't broken; the system was actually working.

When my colleague from the New Democratic Party made reference to both the Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady, there were well over 550 refugees. The current system identified security risks, and those individuals—I believe there were six of them—are still in detention today because the Government of Canada has concerns in regard to that. There should be no doubt among committee members that there is nothing wrong with the system we have here today.

The third and broader issue is biometrics. As I pointed out in an earlier comment, this isn't something new. It's been happening throughout the world. In fact, it was first introduced somewhere around seven or eight years ago as a pilot project. I think the committee recognized that fact, and that's the reason we were investigating the issue of biometrics and how it might be able to benefit Canadian society going forward.

It would have been a whole lot better to have completed that study, reviewed the pilot project that was initiated years ago, and then developed a separate piece of legislation in order to deal with that. Then we could have had witnesses or whoever else participate to have better definition or clarification of the regulations to address some of the questions that were being posed.

In principle, we have been consistent in saying that we do not support Bill C-31 because it does establish two tiers of refugees. There is the whole concept of mandatory detention. Even though I acknowledge that after listening to the committee and the public, the government and the minister did recognize that they had made a mistake—and that's a good thing—we are very concerned about this family separation issue. That's why I asked for a recorded vote on clause 81. I wanted to make sure that it was perfectly clear and that people in this committee realized that we were preventing families from being able to reunite, or at least this minister was.

From an opposition point of view, I can tell you that the Liberal Party will be watching very closely what this minister does and how he decides to use his new power potentially against those victims—I underline the word “victims”—of the Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady. They have come from a country in which they were victims. Is this minister going to revictimize them? We'll have to wait and see, but rest assured, this is an issue the Liberal Party will be following very closely.

We are concerned with the timelines. There's so much within the legislation, and that's why, at the end of the day, I believe we would have been far better off, at the very least, to bring back this bill six months from now. How could we make this a bill that would deserve the title we're giving it? Right now, I don't believe it deserves the assigned title.

If we were to allow more time and genuinely fix the bill, there might be some merit for this particular clause, but as it stands right now, we do not support clause 1. I look forward to the bill entering third reading and debate in the House, where I'll be able to add a few more comments from my perspective and the perspective of the Liberal Party of Canada.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

If the minister designates the safe countries, his discretionary power will obviously increase. At any rate, Bill C-11 talked about having a panel of experts. But we have completely moved away from that idea. As the HCR said, the practice of designating safe countries of origin is only a tool used for a procedure. Since it is a tool, we need to have basic qualitative criteria to be able to make decisions on designating safe countries.

As Ms. Sims pointed out and as some witnesses reported to this committee, we also have to consider that some so-called democratic countries do not protect certain segments of their populations, such as transgendered people, lesbians and gays. We also heard Gina's testimony. She belongs to the Roma community and she spoke at great length about how persecuted those people are.

So we are asking the government to support our amendment. Thank you.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Chairperson, I'm not going to take a pass on being able to provide comment on this particular amendment because, quite frankly, it allows me also to reflect on what was a fairly unanimous consensus, or whatever you want to call it, from the old Bill C-11. I think this amendment picks up a good portion of that, but not the essence of it.

The essence of it was in regard to the safe country list and how that safe country list is going to be developed. There are differing opinions on it.

In this amendment we see that we want to put something more in legislation, because it's more of a cautionary note. To what degree do we really want this particular minister or any future minister to have the power to designate a country as a safe country?

We, as a political party, have made it very clear that we don't believe the minister should be deciding what is a safe country and what is not a safe country.

This amendment, as proposed, could have been even better—but then it would likely have been ruled out of order, I suspect—by incorporating the idea of returning to having an advisory council, something that did receive unanimous support from a previous House.

I just want to emphasize that point and look to the government to recognize the past achievement of this committee. I wasn't a part of it back then. Mr. Dykstra was a part of that committee. We are taking a significant backwards step by not acknowledging what was agreed to in the past.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Our intention, once again, is to try to reinstate something that existed in Bill C-11, which is an advisory panel that would be looking at designating countries or safe countries. That was our only intent, and I'm hoping you will now let this amendment stand.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

I want to thank my colleague for the history lesson. It's always good.

The reason for moving this amendment is that the landscape has changed. In Bill C-11, it was a panel of experts, an advisory committee that would look at criteria and would be doing the designation. Our concern is that now it's going to be the minister doing the designations. A lot of that may be there in the regulations when they come down the road later, but right now we do not have them and they're not part of this legislation. Because of that, we want to clarify in the legislation and send the message out that this is not the unintended consequence that could result.

Just as we saw the unintended consequence that was realized when we looked at the deletion of (e) in an earlier motion...that's all we're trying to address here. It's not a clever move to sidestep or to get any further rights. It's basically looking for something explicit that would give the kind of protection that used to exist there, which was much more transparent than the future is going to be.

It's very hard, quite honestly, for me as a parliamentarian, to sit here passing a law, going through a law, where so much of the stuff is going to be in regulations and we don't know what's going to be in those regulations yet. I don't know what's going to be written in there. This is why, if the regulations were written and were brought here and we could vote on them...then I can just imagine that we might see all of this spelled out and we may not have had a need to move this amendment.

Mr. Dykstra, with that motivation, I hope you will see why it is so important for you to support this and to give us that unanimous support, so we get an amendment passed. This one, actually, absolutely is needed to give many communities out there that sense of assurance they are looking for.

Thank you.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

With respect to amendment NDP-16, Mr. Chair, I believe the emphasis has to be placed on the importance of the right to appeal in our immigration system. The establishment of the Refugee Appeal Division, the RAD, is a welcome step in the refugee determination system, and it takes its creation from Bill C-11.

We've heard from many witnesses that unfortunately mistakes can be made at the IRB. We heard that an unintended consequence of the expedited claims is that more mistakes may be made. Also, new information may come to light, and without access to the RAD, the Refugee Appeal Division, this information may not be allowed to be heard. The consequence of these negative decisions can be someone's life. The RAD is a precautionary safeguard, and it is for this reason that this bar is dangerous.

We have said time and time again that an asylum seeker's mode of arrival should not determine how we treat them. Mode of arrival, how somebody comes to this country, shouldn't designate them as a second-class refugee. A mode of arrival has no bearing on mistakes that can be made in the determination process.

A judicial review is unfortunately not good enough for this, as new facts may come to light. We need to ensure that there is an accessible safeguard mechanism in place to remedy any error. This bar undermines our international obligations to refugee claimants.

The Refugee Appeal Division should be accessible for all types of claimants.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Once again, we are pleased that the government has acknowledged that detention without legitimate reason is against the fundamental rights of refugee claimants.

We remain fundamentally opposed to detention, and we have expressed that a number of times, and to the designation of two-tiered refugees and of treating people who are coming to us from very, I would say, fragile situations as criminals when they arrive here. However, this amendment appears to be a corollary to the amendment in clause 25. We will be asking for immediate release unless the detention is continuing for these reasons, and I think those are stipulated: danger to public, flight risk, security threat, and the identity is not established.

That is just to let the government side know that we will be supporting this amendment, because once again we feel that the government has made a move in the right direction. The absolute right move to have been made in this case would have been to accept the fact that we needed to allow Bill C-11 to be operationalized, and at the other end, to have accepted some of our other recommendations, but as Mr. Dykstra pointed out, this committee stage is an important stage in the legislative process. It is a chance where we get to take time...and I wish we had more time to reflect on the testimony we heard and to review it, because I like to go over those things in detail, but I haven't had that time.

It behooves us, then, when the government makes a step in the direction to address some of the issues that have been raised, to acknowledge that action, and I'm doing so here. But once again, you do know that we are fundamentally opposed to detention of arrivals to our doorsteps except for identification and security reasons.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Yes, I would like to speak to it.

I want to acknowledge that the minister and my colleagues across the way certainly did listen and hear the concerns expressed by the myriad number of experts, as Mr. Dykstra said, whether they were advocacy groups, lawyers, or refugees themselves, who came forward and talked about the legalities of this and the concerns around detention.

Let me put it on the record: we are still against mandatory detention. We're still against the two-tier approach, but we are also here to try to mitigate this bill as far as we can, and to make it work. We did try a previous amendment in which we wanted a review done within 48 hours.

In light of the fact that the government feels that is not doable, and also the fact that our amendment was defeated, we are here with a compromise in the form of this subamendment, and we are now saying seven days. I think to have seven days for the initial review is very generous. And we're looking at people who are imprisoned; we're not talking about people who are walking around out there. I'm certainly hoping that my colleagues will be open to that.

The other is that after that initial review there should be reviews every 30 days, and once again, that's doable. We are not saying that everybody who comes to our shores by whichever means should just walk in without going through certain checks. We realize identification and security checks have to be done.

At the same time, we don't feel we should be welcoming asylum seekers—just because of their mode of arrival or because of the numbers they arrive in—by putting all of them in detention, in jail, for 14 days without their even getting a chance for review, and then six months after that...?

I think when we look at our rule of law and habeas corpus and various existing conventions, this is way over the top, and as much as I appreciate the move made by the government...I want to acknowledge that and get that on the record. At the same time, I feel it does not go far enough. One of the basic things we value is our liberty, and what we want for ourselves, we want for others. So to take away somebody's liberty for 14 days before they even get to find out what's going on and get a chance to present a case, I'm sure is not humane. It will also contravene many....

I'm not a lawyer, so I'm not going to get into the legalese.

Also, six months after that...that's a long time. With the current system...I know I've heard my colleague say we need that 12 months. I want to remind all of us, we have more than 12 months now. Mr. Dykstra, I'm sure you know we still have people from the boat situation in custody; they haven't been released yet.

Our current legislation, including Bill C-11, covers a lot of the concerns we have, and I hope the government will look at this subamendment in the way it is meant. It is meant in good faith to make something work, and we also heard your concerns around the 48 hours, so we've gone to the seven days. We certainly hope you would support this.

It would be good to get unanimous support for an opposition amendment.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you very much, Chair.

We are moving this amendment at this time to address some of the concerns we've had about this mandatory detention. As you can see, we have proposed two amendments. One of them was that if we should end up with a designated group, like a minimum number—and we have suggested 50—that would lead to the designation of irregular arrivals. But as we did not get that, we're introducing a periodic review of the detention regime for designated foreign nationals, consistent with that which exists for permanent residents and foreign nationals under section 57 of IRPA, to ensure that the initial review occurs within 48 hours, then within 7 days, and once every 30 days thereafter. So it would occur every 30 days. In this we are also hoping we can raise the age of detention from 16 to 18.

They say you never give up, you keep trying in different ways, and we will, because this is what we believe in.

Mr. Chair, we don't move these amendments very lightly or to be obstructionist; we're moving these amendments because we have some serious concerns around the charter and constitutional challenges, and also international conventions.

In my previous life, my experience has been that two or three lawyers can sit down in the same room and you're not always going to get the same interpretation of the language before you. In this room we heard lawyer after lawyer, and even, I would say, witnesses who were more pro-government, saying that this could create a problem.

I think it is really imperative. I am very sensitive to the fact that my colleagues across the way and the minister heard the concern and they have put forward an amendment as well, which will come later. I want to acknowledge that we realize you have heard that. However, we believe this is the right way to go. Within 48 hours we should be able to do that first review. You know what? If we're worried about large groups, we've offered the government a solution for that, and that is to designate what a large group is; we put the number at 50. Of course, there was no will for that, so our position is that nobody should be detained without a review within 48 hours, and then another review within 7 days, and another review 30 days thereafter.

When you look at it, we're not trying to create new language here; we've gone into IRPA and lifted the language out of there to reflect it here.

If the concern is that this does not work with larger groups, I want to assure my colleagues across the way that I am willing, and I'm sure everybody on this side of the table is, and I'm hoping my colleague at the end of the line is as well, to reopen that clause where we were looking for a number of, let's say, 50 that would lead to irregular designations, and then we had suggested a different timeline for those designations. Because my colleagues across the way are not prepared to accept a number for those irregular arrivals when they arrive in large numbers, it leads me to believe we have to go back to living with the processes we have, and those are the timelines we are supporting here.

I could spend the next hour and a half reading into the record the testimony of witness after witness, from every party, who said the imperative nature of the government addressing this.... But you will all be relieved to know that I'm not going to do that. What I am going to stress very strongly is for my colleagues across the way to support this.

As you know, it is not a secret that we're opposed to many aspects of this legislation. We believe it's fundamentally flawed. We don't believe in a two-tiered refugee system. We believe everybody who arrives on our shore as a refugee or as an asylum seeker, no matter how they arrive here, should be treated exactly the same. We are willing to admit and to acknowledge, and to actually celebrate, the fact that our current system, including the much-appraised Bill C-11, already has in it the ability to detain until identity and security checks have been done. There's a review built in there. So for us, this review on a regular, prompt, and timely basis.... Before we put anybody in prison, we really have to justify it and we have to be able to review it. That person who is being detained has the right to that review.

By the way, we're not saying release the person if they are a national security risk or if they have criminality that puts Canadians at risk or if we don't know their identity.

We have been very reasonable here, once again, because this opposition wants to make things work. We've heard the government's concerns and we've worked very hard to try to address those. At the same time, we also have to protect the public purse. That's our job, too, to help you protect the public purse. The way we do that is to prevent you from leaving yourselves open to horrendous litigation and all the costs that go with it.

Mr. Dykstra, I know you're going to support this, and I look forward to hearing your response.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Obviously, if the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration feels that a situation requires and warrants an application for permanent residency on the basis of humanitarian and compassionate grounds, this application should be allowed due process, and a deportation order should wait until this application has been finalized.

Additionally, we heard from Mr. Les Linklater, the assistant deputy minister at Citizenship and Immigration Canada, that his department has recently transitioned to an improved way to assess humanitarian and compassionate applications, as passed by Bill C-11 in 2011.

We need to allow these improvements to work through the system and evaluate their impact before wasting more time and money in rewriting these provisions yet again.

Thank you.

(Amendment negatived)

(Clauses 14 and 15 agreed to on division)

(On clause 16)

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Once again, Mr. Chair, I want to reiterate that we believe the current legislation, Bill C-11, would address the concerns we've heard expressed from the government side.

Right now, none of the designated people could receive a temporary resident visa or anything else for up to a year. They may not even have travel documents or anything else. What we're saying, and what this amendment says, is that the only people who would not be given a temporary resident visa are those for whom identity has not been determined and for whom security requirements have not been addressed. But as soon as those two things are done, then people should have documents.

(Amendment negatived)

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

The NDP's position is that we are not supportive of two categories of refugees. We believe the current legislation, which was Bill C-11, allows for the government to identify and do security checks. We feel that is adequate.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you very much.

It's not going to come as a surprise to anybody around this table that the NDP is very, very concerned with the kind of speed with which we're going through this legislation. I don't know about the rest of my colleagues, but after hearing the hours and hours and days and days of testimony, there is a lot for us to review. It's not only the verbal testimony we heard, but the very thick briefs that were submitted. To read and digest all of that before we get into clause-by-clause, as you can imagine, all our brain cells need a little bit more time. That is why I brought that motion forward, or tried to, to say that we should suspend. It was not to say that we should never come back to it; it was to suspend.

New Democrats are concerned about the lack of time we're going to have. This was also eloquently stated by other witnesses, such as Peter Edelmann, from the National Immigration Law Section of the Canadian Bar Association. On May 1 he said: “What is of particular concern is the speed with which this complex legislation is being passed without the time to properly study it.” I really want to stress that: “without the time to properly study it”.

We're being asked to pass a bill on a very short timeline, and we don't know how many more unintentional consequences there will be. And they are in this bill. No one that I'm aware of has been able to study this bill in depth in terms of all of the unintended consequences. We simply haven't had time to study in depth this piece of legislation. Never mind not having studied the legislation, we've had witnesses—legal, community groups, refugees—who have come to present to us, and I don't think we've had adequate time to give all of that testimony due consideration either.

Notwithstanding that, there are key areas in this bill we have major concerns with, but as the official opposition we want to make things work. We are not here to try to slow things down. As a matter of fact, we can't wait to get to clause-by-clause, so I'm planning to keep my comments fairly brief. We do want to make things work. That's why we have submitted 20-plus amendments. We will be looking forward to seeing the amendments. We've seen them, actually, but we look forward to hearing the rationale. And if there are additional amendments from either the Liberals or the Conservatives, we will give them due consideration. We want to make this work for some of the most vulnerable people who are going to be arriving on our doorstep, and we want to ensure that they are granted due process.

Some of our key concerns have been highlighted and corroborated by many, many witnesses. I wish I had the time to read into the record all that they said, but we don't. These concerns include:

—The provision that gives the minister the power to hand-pick those countries he thinks are safe. This would do away with an independent panel of experts.

—The ability to detain refugee claimants for a year without review. Once again, that causes us major, major concern, because not only are we looking at contraventions of our international obligations, but of our own charter and constitution and habeas corpus.

—Measures to deny some refugees access to the new refugee appeal division, which, once again, is simply an anathema.

—A five-year mandatory wait for bona fide refugees to become permanent residents and reunite with their families.

Once again, I want to stress that one of the things we've often heard is about the security of Canadians, about protecting Canadians. Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, agreed to by the parties and praised by the current minister, actually addresses those concerns, because current legislation allows for identification and security checks to be done before people are released.

With all of that in mind, one of the things we are very, very committed to and want to appreciate is that there has been some movement from the minister. We saw a little bit of it in the clause, and from what he said today we're looking forward to more. We will be looking at his proposals closely at committee and taking them very seriously.

That said, we've also heard overwhelmingly from witnesses in the past two weeks that this bill is fundamentally flawed. Tweaking it is not going to fix it. This bill does nothing to prevent human smuggling, since our punitive measures for smuggling are already there. What it does is punish yet again the most vulnerable people arriving on our doorstep.

We have a bill in place that could actually become operational. We could take a look at Bill C-11 over a longer period, study it, and make sure that we do it right. It's in all our interests to make sure that we do all our legislation right. We will be looking at all of the measures. My colleague from the Liberal Party clearly articulated the concerns that we have expressed, and that witnesses have expressed as well. On this piece of legislation, we need to take a break. We need to suspend and make sure that we do it right.

I want to appeal to my colleagues across the way. Let's take a suspension, let's operationalize Bill C-11, and let's do this right.

[Lorne Waldman]

We in principle don't support it. The reason we don't support it is that my experience is that many countries that appear to be democratic are not necessarily democratic, or may not be democratic for a subcategory of individuals. The best case is Mexico. Some of the cases I've seen out of Mexico are shocking and appalling, and you can see some of the recent decisions of the Federal Court that reflect that. Mexico has huge issues in terms of state protection. They have a huge drug trafficking problem, and it's created major problems for individuals.

You referenced the UN. I understand the UNHCR supported the idea of a designated country list as it was drafted in Bill C-11, which meant that there would be expedited hearings for people from designated countries. They certainly didn't support the idea of removal of an appeal.

We agreed, as a compromise, to support a designated country of origin list if it meant an expedited hearing. But the problem with the current incarnation of the bill is, (a), the designated country of origin list does more than that. It removes the right of appeal, it removes the mandatory stay. And (b), the timeframes for the hearings are completely unrealistic. So you're saying you're going to give a sham of a hearing to a person who won't have enough time to properly present his case, to satisfy the constitutional guarantees.

I can tell you that we'll challenge that under the charter, because a fair hearing means a hearing that allows a person enough time to prepare a case, to present a case in a meaningful fashion, and 15 days and 30 days, in my view, isn't going to cut the mustard.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you very much, the three of you, for coming to spend some quality time with us.

I think all of you will be aware that just a year ago we adopted Bill C-11 and the components of Bill C-11. Also, I think it has been very clear as we have questioned both staff and others that the key elements from Bill C-11 have not been implemented yet, so we actually don't even know whether we really have a problem.

Bill C-11 is called the great compromise. The minister and our critic of the day, Olivia Chow—and I'm sure Mr. Dykstra was involved in it as well—all talked about it being a great piece of legislation, because it brought all the elements together and there was a lot of agreement. It seemed to address the key issues arising from boatloads of people coming to B.C.'s shore, the two boats.

I have to say that most of those people—as we know, even before Bill C-11—have been accepted as refugees. Refugees very rarely stop to think, especially if their lives are in danger and they've had the kinds of persecution they've had, about the dangers of the seas, because they're in a corner and they have to escape. They're worried about their lives, limbs, and their families, and all of that. They came to our shores, and as we know, a vast majority of them have been accepted as legitimate refugees.

In Bill C-11 Canada also has, I would say, some of the strongest sentencing for human smugglers. Really, in Canada we can't go greater than life imprisonment, because we don't have the death penalty in Canada, and I'm not hearing anybody from either side say that it is where we want to go. So we already have the strongest deterrent possible for smugglers, a life sentence and also $1 million in fines.

But as you know, smugglers are very sophisticated operatives. I often say that while we're chasing the victims, they're probably sitting—and I don't mean to malign New York—in a New York side street café drinking lattes and wearing their Armani suits, for all we know.

Yet it's the victims I want to focus on here, because I believe Bill C-11 already has very strong punitive measures towards smugglers. I also recognize the fact, and I would say many experts do, that smuggling is an international problem—it's a curse across the world—and it needs to have governments working together to address it in a way that targets the smugglers, not the victims again.

The other aspect of Bill C-11 is the detention part. Bill C-11 allows detention of people, but not just for a year; they can even be detained longer, for identification and for security checks. But what's different about Bill C-11 is that periodically you have to go back and justify why you want that extension.

So as far as detention goes, I think it's already covered, because the minister, even under the current system, has been able to keep some people in detention for far longer than this; whereas with this new piece of legislation, all the irregular arrivals would end up in detention. Notice a marked difference from where Germany is, as we heard in earlier testimony as well.

The other concern, when I look at all of this, is over the detention. My colleagues across the aisle have sort of said, “Yes, but the minister....” That's another concern we have: there is too much power in the hands of a minister.

It's not because it's this minister; I would have concerns about a minister of any stripe having that much power in individual hands. What we're seeing is more and more of that power being centralized and therefore losing some of the objectivity that you count on when you have a panel of experts, say, or others.

One of the other things we're hearing a lot about is cost. Well, I can tell you that the cost of detention is very, very high. I have often said that if we were willing to spend even one-tenth of what we're prepared to spend on detention for youth...in my previous life. We would not have the need to have that many detention places if we were willing to spend one-tenth on education, on prevention programs, and a lot of those things.

But in this case, the cost for detention for a year...? This is for everybody who comes here in an irregular way in a group of more than two—except for families, and I appreciated that clarification this morning. We really have to take a look at that as well. Surely this can't be another prison-building agenda when we look at where we want to go with our refugee policy.

One of the other concerns we've had raised by quite a few witnesses of all stripes is the timelines and the kind of charter challenges that could be opened because people are not being given due process.

Other countries that have taken these kinds of measures of mandatory detention are actually moving away from them. Here we are in Canada, a progressive country; instead of learning from the mistakes of others, we have a tendency in the last little while to want to copy the mistakes of detention.

Thank you.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This has become a recurring theme. I had hoped that when we started the process, in terms of witness presentation—and I don't hold any of you responsible for this—we would be hearing from different themes in terms of support or not support of the bill. I find I'm repeating myself on a regular basis.

Based on the opposition that you have to the bill, I understand your perspective, but we have heard it on a number of occasions already. In fact, I do want to clarify a couple of things.

Number one, the former United Nations High Commissioner Abraham Abraham said that the UNHCR does not oppose the introduction of a designated or safe country of origin list, as long as this is used as a procedural tool to prioritize or accelerate examination of applications in carefully circumscribed situations and not as an absolute bar. Many countries, including the United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, and Finland all use and implement the designated safe country.

In terms of the criteria for claimants from countries—for example, there are two quantitative thresholds for countries that have a mass number of applications into our country, for those who are seeking asylum as refugees. They have to meet one of two quantitative thresholds, or limits, as set out in the order. The proposed triggers for a review are based on rejection rates, withdrawal, and abandonment rates. A rejection rate, which includes abandonment and withdrawal, of 75% or higher would trigger a review. Similarly, an abandonment and withdrawal rate of 60% or higher would also trigger a review, and I repeat “a review”. It doesn't automatically mean that the designation is going to take place. An internal review led by the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration, in partnership with a number of other ministries within the government, will make the determination or recommendation based on a review that the country that is in question has either hit the criteria from a quantitative perspective or is subject to a review based on the number of withdrawals or abandonments that we have seen. So there are defined criteria that will be here.

I was part of Bill C-11. I sat through every minute of the hearings, and also the negotiations in terms of moving it forward, and 80% to 85% of Bill C-11 is going to move forward. There are just additional aspects that we have brought to the table here.

Under Bill C-11, which was a problem with respect to the designated country, there was no provision for transparent criteria. The criteria would be determined by the group itself. The concern we had was (a) what would those criteria consist of, and (b) there were no assurances as to the time allocation of how long that determination process would take. So at least through here, (a) we have a transparent set of criteria, and (b) we actually know the timeframe within which this designated country application will actually take place.

For claimants from countries with a low number of claims, we're actually going to move to a qualitative checklist, which will be established right in the legislation itself. So the qualitative checklist will include (1) the existence of an independent judicial system in that country; (2) recognition of basic democratic rights and freedoms, including mechanisms for redress if those rights or freedoms are infringed; and (3) the existence of civil society organizations.

While I respect that you may not agree with the process in terms of how we come to the conclusion, it's unfair, and it's also untrue to state that there aren't qualitative and quantitative criteria built in to both the legislation and the mechanism that will be used to go through the process for review. It's really important that this gets put on the table. I think part of the reason that folks come to the table and state that they're unsure of, or leery of, the designated safe country is that this information isn't necessarily at your fingertips. I do understand that is a concern, but I also understand that as we move forward in terms of Bill C-31...and part of the reason why we're doing these hearings is to afford us all the opportunity to understand the bill as it sits in a much stronger form.

Kelsey, I wanted to ask you about one of the concerns I have. I respect the fact that the opposition to a particular piece of legislation is democratic, but so is the support of the legislation, and we've heard from a majority of Canadians across this country that in fact this bill doesn't go far enough and that it should be more aggressive in its nature. We don't necessarily agree with that. We want a bill that is going to do both: suit and meet the expectations of most Canadians, and also, obviously, respect the rule of law as closely as we possibly can.

You spoke a number of times about the issue of rights and fairness. Over the last decade, we're talking about approximately 100,000 to 120,000 refugees who have come to this country and have been accepted, of which there were only 600 in the last decade.... Two ships have come here with approximately 600 people, and you've spent a great deal of time focused on the rights of those 600 individuals, while not acknowledging and complimenting the fact that between 100,000 and 120,000 refugees in fact have had those rights, in the same aspect that you're talking about.

So what we're concerned about here is only one small part of the bill, which gets at the irregular arrivals. I think it's important to note that we are talking about...less than half a per cent of the impact of our system within this bill is focused on those who come as different arrivals—other than by land or off-land.

I come to this point because currently we have over 40,000 individuals who have claimed refugee status in Canada and who we can't find. We don't know where they are. We have over 2,000 individuals who were approved for permanent residency or refugee status and actually got it by basically cheating the system, by not being forthright and honest about their perspective—or at least their claim.

For me, when you say we have to protect the rights of an individual, we also have to protect the rights of Canadians, and my concern is that we cannot.... I know it's important that everyone is as equal as we can potentially come to, but there is a balance that gets struck when we have over 40,000 people—and that's why I believe the system is broken—who we currently cannot locate. We do not know where they are. Now, we don't know if they present a danger to society; we won't know until something actually happens. But then...and there, I think, is where the rights of Canadians as individuals are and that we as a collective have to ensure. The government's responsibility is to protect those rights as well.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses as well. Going back to the motivation for this bill, we've heard some government members say it's to deter the asylum seekers from coming in large numbers, and we've heard others many times say it's not about deterrence.

In your expert opinion of the bill—and we know that Bill C-11 still hasn't been implemented and Bill C-31 is now being pushed through—what do you think is the motivation? Either one of you.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In listening to both presentations, but Catherine's in particular, I can't help but think that here we are passing Bill C-31, or we're here in committee with the expectation that the government is going to want to pass this bill, but hopefully there will be a series of amendments to the bill.

You paint a fairly bleak picture. In essence, you're saying that Australia's system has clearly demonstrated its failure, specifically in and around that whole mandatory detention question. We seem to be going further than what Australia is actually currently putting in place.

My question to you is, do you think this is in fact a bill that can be amended, or should it just be sent back? Should we allow the previous bill, Bill C-11, to go forward and just go back to the drawing board? What would be your suggestion?

[Sharalyn Jordan]

Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, provided for consultation with human rights groups before a country could be designated. That's one of the measures that's been removed in Bill C-31.

So yes, I do see that as one of the problems with the way that the designated country list has been included in Bill C-31.

[Sharalyn Jordan]

Thank you.

On behalf of all my colleagues at the Rainbow Refugee Committee, I want to thank you for giving us the opportunity to share our point of view on Bill C-31.

Rainbow Refugee supports efforts to create a fair, efficient, effective, and affordable refugee system. We share goals of upholding the integrity of refugee determination. In 2010, we were grateful for the opportunity to discuss Bill C-11 with this standing committee and we took notice when parliamentarians worked together and listened to those of us who work closely with refugees to revise what is now the Balanced Refugee Reform Act.

Rainbow Refugee is disturbed to see that Bill C-31 resurrects measures that we identified as problematic, and includes new measures that disproportionately harm lesbian, gay, bi, trans, and queer refugees. These concerns are based on a decade of experience focused on this work.

Canada has been a global leader in refugee protection for those facing persecution due to sexual orientation or gender identity. We were the first country to recognize that transphobia and homophobia can result in persecution; 21 countries now do the same. This protection is vital in a world where 76 countries continue to criminalize lesbian, gay, bi, and trans people.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you very much.

Yesterday we heard some numbers being thrown around about the processing of the Roma and the kind of impact they're having, and so we have asked our analysts to provide the whole committee with some data so we're actually talking about the facts rather than numbers that seem to change quite frequently.

One of the other things, as you are both aware, is that we have Bill C-11, which was agreed to by all parties. It hasn't been fully implemented. In Bill C-11 there is a provision to detain someone. Obviously our current system allows us to detain someone until identification takes place. Even under the current system, we have this huge shortage of detention spaces and, from the picture you and many others have painted over the last few days, some of the conditions in these detention places, prisons, are not those where we would want to have people housed, especially asylum seekers who are coming from very dangerous areas. There is a cost to the taxpayer.

Could you expand a little bit more, Ms. Nakache, on what was in the Auditor General's report and on the cost of buying space in prisons?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Actually, the purpose of detention is to ensure that before individuals go into Canadian society we have an understanding of who they are and whether they are qualified refugees or in fact they are not refugees. As we found with the Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady, people aboard those ships were actually war criminals or terrorists.

Part of it, from our perspective, is the importance of identifying individuals who are claiming refugee status and understanding who those individuals are and what their past is all about. It's an issue of safety.

Let me be clear. In the last decade this has made up less than 0.5% of what our refugee system is all about. When we talk about a refugee system overall—you pointed it out, and I'm proud to hear that even as far away as Australia, Canada is considered to have one of the best refugee and immigration systems in the world—it doesn't mean that we are fixed or we shouldn't be improving it.

Part of the problem is that less than 40% of those who apply for refugee status actually achieve that refugee status in the country. The system itself is so broken that it takes upwards of two and a half years on average to get an initial response to a refugee claim.

We have individuals who lose their refugee cases after three or four sets of appeals. They've spent seven or eight years in this country. They get married here, have children, purchase homes, have jobs, and they're forced to go back to their country because they've failed to qualify as a refugee. Our system is such that we need to fix it.

We just had a witness from the embassy who acknowledged that Hungarians in the thousands were coming to Canada because it was an easy system to take advantage of. The list of what is required to be humanitarian doesn't include that we're easy to take advantage of, that the rest of the world sees us as easy pickings.

Under C-11, which you'll hear some of the opposition members indicate is being replaced by C-31...but clearly 70% to 85% of C-31 is actually what C-11 manufactured. Within C-11 is an additional 2,500 refugees who are coming to this country, of which 2,000 are privately sponsored and 500 are government sponsored. That puts us in the top two or three per capita in the world.

Our system needs to be fixed. It needs to be set in order; it hasn't been in many years, almost decades. But at the same time we still want to maintain—and I hope you understand this government's intention as far away as Australia—the integrity of that system and in fact ensure that it remains one of the best systems in the world.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you very much.

I want to thank both of you for taking the time to come and make a presentation.

We've had a number of our witnesses here talking about the designated country of origin. Both of you have really impressed me with your rational approach to it, saying that there is kind of a space for designation, but it needs to be done by a panel of independent experts.

Actually, when you look at Bill C-11, which was the great Canadian compromise that took place only a few months ago, that's exactly where it was at then.

I just want to get on record, did I hear both of you say that?

[Andrew Brouwer]

Thank you you for that question.

We have a range of concerns relating to the designation of countries of safety. It's our first position that it's never appropriate to designate a particular country as safe. Refugees may come from any country in the world, and the reality is that conditions change quickly in countries around the world, so a country that was safe may overnight become very unsafe. The result of the designation is that those people will be denied access to the kinds of protection that Canada should be providing.

In terms of some of the changes that have been proposed in Bill C-31, even as compared to Bill C-11 the last time around...at least the last time around there was to be an advisory committee that included outside advice on which countries were or weren't safe and should or shouldn't be designated. The minister has taken out any access for external advice and turned it into a completely insulated government decision, and we have huge concerns about that.

Beyond that, UNHCR has commented about the designation of countries. My understanding about their position is that they have said that in certain circumstances it may not be inappropriate to accelerate claims from some countries, but even the UNHCR has consistently said that an appeal has to be there even if you're going to designate a country. Bill C-31 takes that appeal away, and, as I mentioned earlier, not only does it take that appeal away, but there is also no real access to Federal Court for people from designated countries.

We're also concerned about the changes at the IRB, about the fact that decision-makers at the Refugee Protection Division now will be civil servants, not people who are put there for a fixed term with some degree of independence. They are now going to be the only people hearing claims from people from countries that their boss has designated as safe. We have concerns about how that is going to be impacting their ability to make impartial decisions on refugee claims before them.

[Richard Goldman]

Not at all, for the reasons we have touched on already: unrealistic timelines, lack of the right of appeal, mandatory detention for many claimants for one year.

We agreed, touching on something that's been brought up a number of times, that there are problems with the current system. Why are there problems? As our colleague Maître Bohbot said, in large part because the government did not staff the Immigration and Refugee Board and essentially broke the system, and now says that because the system's broken we have to do something radical.

We agree that somebody should not have to wait two years for a decision on their refugee claim. However, we don't think you should throw out the baby with the bathwater. Thirty days is too short. No appeal makes it impossible to correct errors. Bill C-11, for all the possible criticisms, was a relatively balanced piece of legislation. We think we should be working on that and improving that, rather than going to something much more radical that denies people's rights.

[Richard Goldman, Spokesperson, Table de concertation des organismes au service des personnes réfugiées et immigrantes]

Thank you, Rivka.

Although the Table de concertation adds its voice to stakeholders such as the Canadian Council for Refugees, which feels that Bill C-31 is so flawed as to require replacement with more balanced legislation, in order to be constructive we will be focusing on the Refugee Appeal Division and post-claim recourses, and providing our observations and recommendations on that.

First of all, the importance of a Refugee Appeal Division has long been recognized. When Parliament adopted the IRPA in 2001, it contained a Refugee Appeal Division, which was supposed to be accessible to all. In Bill C-11, this was adopted. Of course the IRPA RAD was never implemented. It's also important to bear in mind that a number of international human rights agencies have pointed out the pertinence of a Refugee Appeal Division. Quoting from page 2 of our brief:

UNHCR considers an appeal procedure to be a fundamental, necessary part of any refugee status determination process. It allows errors to be corrected, and can also help to ensure consistency in decision-making. Canada, Italy, and Portugal are the only industrialized countries which do not allow rejected asylum seekers the possibility to have first-instance decisions reviewed on points of fact as well as points of law. In the past, a measure of safeguard was provided by the fact that determinations could be made by a two-member panel, with the benefit of the doubt going to the applicant in case of a split decision. With the implementation of IRPA on June 28th, 2002, this important safeguard will be lost.

Likewise, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has stated:

Given that even the best decision-makers may err in passing judgment, and given the potential risk to life which may result from such an error, an appeal on the merits of a negative determination constitutes a necessary element of international protection.

I'm going to look now at the restrictions on the RAD under Bill C-31. There are four major restrictions, which I'll look at in turn.

First of all, let's consider asylum seekers from designated countries of origin. These claimants will have super-fast-tracked hearings to be held as soon as 30 days after their arrival. This will make it difficult or impossible for them to prepare their case adequately, get documentary proof of persecution, obtain identity documents, or even to secure legal counsel, not to mention overcoming the trauma of rape, sexual assault, or whatever else they may have been through. So the risks of human error in this situation are extremely high.

Second, there is the matter of arriving in Canada as part of an irregular arrival. This has no relation whatever to the merits of a refugee claim. In fact, from certain countries the only way to get out is with false documents. Passport offices may not be functioning or a genuine refugee may not get a passport. If two or more such persons arrive together, if any group arrives together with the assistance of a smuggler, they can be designated an “irregular arrival”. “Group” is not defined in the act, so it could be as few as two people, as far as we can tell. There's no logical basis for a presumption that a group of such claimants coming from, say, Iran, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, or Somalia are making abusive claims that do not merit a right of appeal.

Third, there are persons who have claimed asylum at the Canada-U.S. border already, under the U.S.-Canada Safe Third Country Agreement. Very few refugees can enter at the border and make an asylum claim. There are a few exceptions. The main exception that remains today is to have a family member in Canada. If somebody manages to enter at the border and claims asylum, he will also be subject to a restriction on his right of appeal. We really don't understand why this should be the case. As a matter of fact, in a briefing call that was held right after the introduction of Bill C-31, it was explained to us that the worst that could happen to these people is that they'd be returned to the States. Actually, that's an error. As of the expiry of the reciprocal agreement in October 2009, it's not possible to return them to the States. They would be sent directly to their country of alleged persecution, with no right of appeal. So this seems to be based entirely on an error.

With the fourth exception, “manifestly unfounded or no credible basis” claims, the above three exceptions kick in even before the claimant has been heard by the IRB.

This fourth exception only kicks in at the IRB itself. What can happen is a person who in principle has a right to appeal can have their hearing, and if the decision-maker says that the claim is manifestly unfounded or has no credible basis, they will lose their right to appeal. This strikes us as extremely perverse, because the decision-maker in effect can insulate himself or herself from review. In other words, if they make a small mistake and refuse a well-founded claim, it can go on appeal. If they make a big mistake and say that a well-founded claim is manifestly unfounded, it can't be reviewed.

It seems to us that all of these exceptions therefore violate basic principles of fairness and in some cases even logic.

It's also important to keep in mind that these same four categories will not have effective access to the Federal Court, because although it's possible for them to apply to the Federal Court, they will no longer benefit from a stay of removal. Therefore, they can be removed on day 31 or 61 and have no appeal, no access to the Federal Court in practical terms.

Other post-claim recourses are also being eliminated. The so-called pre-removal risk assessment, or PRA, wasn't a very good procedure, but this will be practically eliminated, because people will not have access for 12 months after refusal. The government has said it wants to remove people far faster than that, so practically speaking the PRA will be out the window.

Final recourse that is also effectively being eliminated is the humanitarian and compassionate recourse. This does not overlap with the refugee claim. It takes into account other things, such as gender-based discrimination, or other types of discrimination that do not rise to the level of persecution. It can also take into account best interests of the child, and so on. An exception is created in the law for humanitarian applications based on best interests of the child and medical considerations. However, no stay of removal is being provided for those cases. They can still be removed on day 31 or day 61. Consequently, as a result of these different exceptions to the RAD, there is the very unrealistic 15-day timeline for filing at the RAD. We can talk about that more.

This, along with the gutting of the other post-claims recourses, means that we may finally have a Refugee Appeal Division in Canada, and yet the majority of refused claimants will have absolutely no avenue to have their refusal reviewed.

Our recommendations are as follows. First of all, Bill C-31 should be withdrawn and replaced with fair and balanced legislation. On the specific topic of the Refugee Appeal Division, all claimants should have access to the RAD. The corresponding regulations should allow 45 days for filing and perfection of appeals to the RAD. The bar on filing of humanitarian and compassionate applications while a refugee claim is pending and for 12 months following a refusal should be removed. Humanitarian and compassionate applicants should benefit from an automatic stay of removal until such time as their humanitarian and compassionate applications are ruled upon.

Thank you.

[Nicolas Plourde, President of the Bar, Barreau du Québec]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ladies and gentlemen members of the committee, as the elected President of the Barreau du Québec, I want to thank you for inviting us today to discuss such an important issue for Canadians—the security and effectiveness of our immigration system.

I would like to begin by emphasizing the importance the Barreau du Québec attaches to the improvement of the security and effectiveness of the Canadian immigration system. I invite you to read about the Barreau du Québec's previous involvement in the area of immigration, especially the letters regarding bills C-49 and C-11.

As you probably know, the Barreau du Québec is a professional order with a membership of 24,000 Quebec lawyers. The Barreau is proud of its worldwide involvement in the implementation of democratic governance and institutions founded on the rule of law. Its primary purpose is protecting the public. In that work, it strives to carry out its social responsibility by standing up for the democratic values of our society, including human rights.

The Barreau du Québec has reviewed Bill C-31, which reintroduces Bill C-11 and amends the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. The Barreau du Québec fears that the changes the bill makes to the classification process will result in discriminatory and differential treatment of claims, which may undermine claimants' confidence in the legality and legitimacy of the decisions made regarding their refugee protection claims.

That being said, the Barreau du Québec believes that protecting the Canadian immigration system is indeed an important issue and that the Canadian government is right to try to deter illegal immigration. That may make it necessary to circumscribe certain rights in the public interest. However, the bill contains harsh measures, including the automatic detention of designated foreign nationals for a period of up to a year. My colleague Mr. Goldberg will tell you more about the negative effects we fear regarding this measure.

The Barreau du Québec is also opposed to the restriction of the right to appeal a decision on its merits to the Refugee Appeal Division. The Barreau believes that an applicant's confidence in the state calls for the promotion and maintenance of a judicial structure of accessible and independent tribunals, as well as just and effective representation.

Before I yield the floor to my colleague, Mr. Goldberg, for a more thorough account of the Barreau du Québec's position, allow me to quickly introduce him. Mr. Goldberg has been a lawyer and a member of the Barreau du Québec since 1989. He is a member of the Barreau's committee on immigration and citizenship. He has been working in immigration and refugee law since 1990. Therefore, he regularly represents foreign nationals in all sorts of cases involving various immigration applications and refugee protection claims in Canada.

Mr. Goldberg is heavily involved in his area of expertise. He worked as a volunteer for a human rights organization in Guatemala. He is also active within the Canadian Bar Association and its liaison committee with the federal court. He is one of the founding members of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, where he has been the vice-president since 2001.

Mr. Chair, with your permission, I yield the floor to my colleague Mr. Goldberg.

[Debbie Douglas]

With all due respect, I think what we said was that we have Bill C-11, that Bill C-11 was a negotiated bill and that it addresses many of the concerns you have raised. To what—

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Let me answer that question for you, because the man sitting next to you is the exact reason, and the purposes he has mentioned are the exact reasons we had to bring this issue forward. For Bill C-11, I was parliamentary secretary. I sat in every single one of those meetings, and went through the whole process and the negotiations.

I was proud of what happened with respect to Bill C-11, and a lot of the aspects of Bill C-11 are going to move forward because of Bill C-31. So you don't like Bill C-31 and you like Bill C-11, but a lot of what's in Bill C-31 is Bill C-11. So there have to be things in here that you actually appreciate.

My point is that you've listened to what Mr. Skarica has had to say. You've heard about the 15 convictions he has achieved. You've heard from him—it's what he does for a living—that we have not been successful and that our system is broken.

We will not solve the problem of what we have in front of us —this problem right here—with Bill C-11. Bill C-11 will not solve this problem. You know what we'll end up doing if we only do Bill C-11? We'll just simply slap down visas on Hungary and hope that gets us around the issue, as we've had to do with Mexico and the Czech Republic.

That's not the process we want to use. If we're going to enter into agreements with the EU, if we're going to make sure that our economies are like-minded and that we become free-trading partners, we must have a system that the rest of the world believes is foolproof—at least in the efforts that it makes.

The system that we have now in this country, as Mr. Skarica has said, is broken. Simply disregarding Bill C-31 and accepting the fact that a majority of what's in Bill C-11 is good but doesn't go all the way to solving our issue.... I just have to state for the record that I obviously disagree with your position. I respect that you are here. I just wish you wouldn't have stated at the very outset that all of Bill C-31 wasn't good and should be removed.

Second, we need to get tougher to be able to identify the people Mr. Skarica was referring to, and biometrics is in this bill, and you've indicated that it's not worth pursuing—

[Francisco Rico-Martinez]

What I am saying is that we have Bill C-11, which addresses very similar issues in a more holistic way, and was approved by Parliament. We don't understand why we have to review this issue when there was an agreement among political parties. It was approved and it was a decent agreement.

[Francisco Rico-Martinez]

And on the other hand, one of the main problems we have with the modification of the designated country of origin is the process with which that country will be determined. In the original Bill C-11, when it was passed, they were talking about refugee rights, the standards of rights or the standards of violations in that particular country, and a specialized team was going to analyze that particular concept of the evolution of the human rights issues in that particular country.

Now, that situation is gone, and we are only going to use the statistics prepared in Canada, such as the rate of acceptance, withdrawal, and 30 cases in particular time. Those are statistics in Canada. Why don't we go back to the idea of the specialized team that would take a look at the human rights levels or issues going on in that country, and provide a report on that? This would work better.

[Debbie Douglas, Executive Director, Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI)]

I'll begin for OCASI.

Thank you for having us.

The Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants, better known as OCASI, is the provincial umbrella group for agencies that work with immigrant and refugee communities here in Ontario.

OCASI and our member agencies are very concerned about Bill C-31. Let me start off by saying that we're actually asking this committee to recommend that the bill be withdrawn and that we move forward with Bill C-11, which is scheduled for implementation at the end of June of this year.

Very quickly, we are concerned that the bill would create a multiple-tier system of refugee protection in Canada, which we believe could result in some claimants being denied the right to appeal. It makes refugee protection in Canada dangerously vulnerable to political whims, rather than ensuring a fair and independent decision about who is a refugee. It subjects some refugees to different and harsh treatment based on the country of origin, mode of arrival, and whether or not the person has citizenship in Canada, as it has to do with the revocation of permanent residency.

I just want to set the stage a bit in terms of how we have been addressing issues of refugees and asylum seekers before I pass it on to Francisco.

In 2010, Canada accepted about 24,000 refugees in all classes. This was about 11,000 fewer than the 35,000 who were accepted in 2005. In 2005, refugees in all classes accepted in Canada were about 13% of all permanent resident arrivals. In 2010, they were down to 8% of those arrivals, a drop of almost 5%.

In 2005, the number of refugee claimants present in the country constituted approximately 0.3% of the Canadian population. Five years later, in 2010, the percentage of refugees compared to the Canadian population was slightly lower at 0.28%. In 2010, we accepted 3,400 fewer claimants than five years earlier, in 2005. At the same time, the number of people forcibly displaced in countries around the world has been growing.

We believe, and we are deeply concerned, that Bill C-31 will reduce even further the number of individuals who seek to enter Canada in search of asylum.

The minister has said that Canada welcomes more resettled refugees per capita than any other country. Meanwhile, according to the UNHCR “Global Trends” report of 2010 that was released last year, 80% of the world’s refugees are in the global south, in the world’s poorest countries such as Pakistan and the Congo. The report found that roughly 43.7 million people are displaced worldwide. Of that number, 27.5 million people are displaced within their own country due to conflict.

In this global context, Canada’s involvement in resettling refugees, while admirable—and I don't think any of us around this table are arguing about that—doesn't quite measure up to the commitment of other countries in the world. According to the same UNHCR report, in 2010 Canada had 4.2 refugees per U.S. dollar of its per capita GDP compared to Pakistan at 709, Congo at 475, Kenya at 247, and Chad at 224. The comparison becomes more stark when one considers the fact that Canada’s GDP per capita is considerably higher than that in the countries named.

We're also deeply concerned about the growing anti-refugee sentiment in Canada and the extent to which this could be exacerbated by government messaging about the bill. I heard some of the language used earlier today while I was listening to some of the other witnesses makes their presentations and to the question and answer period. Messages that characterize asylum seekers in stereotypically hurtful ways, suggesting that they are bogus and are a drain on Canadian society, can have a harmful effect. We are also deeply troubled by the misperception that these measures are necessary because Canada is facing supposed floods of refugees. This messaging contributes to increased intolerance towards refugees and has a harmful impact on their resettlement opportunities in Canada.

While we believe that most of the measures are quite problematic, let me just concentrate on two pieces and then I promise I'll shut up.

First is shorter time limits. I know that the previous witnesses spent some time on this topic, but we are particularly concerned that the shorter time limits will pose additional difficulties for particular claimants. We are particularly concerned, as a council, with lesbians, gays, and trans folk, as well as women fleeing domestic violence, who often need to develop some sort of trust before they will disclose or “come out”, as we say here in North America, about their sexual orientation or their search around gender identity issues. We believe this will present increasing difficulties for them in having their claim together within the 15 days proposed in this bill.

For me, this is also tied to the safe countries list. I won't go on and on about the safe countries list. You've heard many arguments about the ongoing concerns. But we absolutely know that in countries that Canada has deemed to be democratic, and countries with whom we may have trade agreements, and countries with whom we work closely outside the EU—and you've all heard how safe the EU is for particular groups of people—particular groups still face severe discrimination. This discrimination at times not only leads to severe physical abuse, but also at times to death. Even here in the Americas we have examples of this.

One of the stories that I want to share just briefly, which is about four years old, is about a young Mexican woman whose claim was refused. She was sent back and was killed. Unfortunately, there is a more recent case that came up, the case of Veronica Castro, also from Mexico. Her claim was denied. A year before she was deported she was saying to friends that the decision was a life and death one for her if she were to be sent back , and she was hoping for their prayers. She wrote to one of her friends that her deportation was a matter of life or death, and said: “I'm shaking and terrified every time I think about my deportation. I am really scared”. Thirty-three days later, after being deported back to Mexico, on January 12, 2012, she was murdered.

So those are the kinds of stories that we know and that we are concerned about if we were to move forward, as a country, to adopt this bill.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I appreciate that.

Mr. Rehaag, your original point is of interest to me. I agree with you that it's hard to argue with statistics when you look at the decision-making process and those who make the decisions at the IRB. There are those who approve almost everyone and those who approve almost no one.

You're aware that under Bill C-11 and under this current legislation we will be moving our process from appointed individuals to 100 individuals who will be part of the public service. Therefore, that process will change significantly in terms of where it is now, where it has been in the past, and where it will go in the future, thereby taking direct aim at the statistics that you cover and obviously are able to show.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Is that all I have? I'm so sorry.

For my 30 seconds, I think I will confine myself to a comment, then.

When I read through this, a lot of this language is to strengthen and improve this country's immigration system, or to protect the citizenship of Canada. Of course we want to protect the citizenship of Canada, but I'm looking for the kind of evidence that you have, hard evidence, that our current Bill C-11 policies, if implemented, would actually put Canadians at risk. I don't want to talk about the bogeyman or what-ifs, because those what-ifs exist when anybody arrives in this country.

Thank you.

[Les Linklater]

The transition provisions for C-11 differed for a number of elements within the legislation. There were a couple of provisions that came into force at royal assent, including the way we assessed humanitarian and compassionate applications. There were some operational changes that came as a result of that in June 2011. The bulk of the transition measures were to come into force no later than two years after the date of royal assent, that is, by June 29, 2012. We have been working towards that implementation date. A number of packages of regulations were prepublished last summer. As we got into broader implementation issues, the minister was of the view that we needed to look at further legislative reform. At this point there are very few actual provisions from C-11 that have come into force.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you very much, and my thanks to you both for your presentations.

I wanted to start off with a question you heard me ask the minister the other day. It wasn't too long ago—I don't think the ink has dried on C-11 yet—that the great Canadian compromise was reached, and all parties said how wonderful it was.

How long have you actually been working with the new rules created by C-11?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

I hope so. I regret that the critics of our approach have not even bothered to give a nod in the direction of our enhancement of refugee protection that is part of this broader package. When we launched Bill C-11 I announced a 20% increase in the number of resettled refugees that we would accept worldwide. We already accept one out of every ten. We're going to be the number one destination for resettled refugees worldwide per capita following this increase. We're increasing the refugee assistance program by 20%, and that's not coincidental. We're doing that concurrently with these reforms to the asylum system to send the message that we, as a country, can do more to help bona fide refugees, real victims of persecution, ethnic cleansing, and warfare, if we focus our resources on real refugees and not those who seek to abuse our generosity.

Second, we are for the first time creating a full fact-based appeal that will be available to the vast majority of asylum claimants who are rejected at their initial hearing. That means that for claimants from countries generally known to be or could be sources of persecution, those who don't get positive decisions initially will have a full fact-based appeal. This is what so-called refugee advocates have long demanded. This will take what is already considered a model system and add even additional protection for those who might have a negative decision at first instance.

I don't just “think” this, but objectively I believe this reinforces our longstanding humanitarian obligation to refugees.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

We estimate that the savings under Bill C-11, which is the basic structure of the new asylum system, to be about $1.8 billion over five years. Most of those savings are to be derived by the provinces, because they'll be paying less money in welfare payments to failed asylum claimants, who will be removed in a matter of months rather than several years.

The main savings that we generate are through the interim federal health program. Altogether, along with the scaled-down benefits that I announced yesterday, we estimate there will be about $100 million in savings on the IFH program over five years, again because we're providing those benefits to people for a few months rather than several years.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

First of all, I'd like to congratulate Ms. Sims on her appointment as the critic for immigration and citizenship for the official opposition. I look forward to working with her and all of her colleagues.

I am proud of the compromise that we achieved in Bill C-11 in the last Parliament. I think it was a huge improvement over the status quo. However, we have now seen, since the adoption of that legislation, a continued and growing wave of unfounded asylum claims coming from democratic countries, which represents a fundamental threat to the integrity of our system. Since that time we've seen a growing escalation in the number of unfounded asylum claims coming from Europe. When I say “unfounded”, it's the claimants themselves who indicate that by not showing up for their hearings, in large measure.

So we came to the conclusion that we needed fast and flexible tools to be able to address large waves of unfounded claims from such jurisdictions. That's why we revisited some of the provisions in Bill C-11. This bill, Bill C-31, maintains the basic architecture of Bill C-11. It does maintain the refugee appeal division, which adds an additional procedural safeguard for the vast majority of failed asylum claimants. It does maintain a faster system. The system in Bill C-31 is faster and fairer. The main difference is a streamlined appeals process for people coming from countries that do not normally produce refugees. This reflects normal practice in other liberal democratic countries with respect to their asylum systems.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Thank you, and welcome to the committee, Mr. Minister. We're here at the same time.

Minister, in 2010, you singled out one of my colleagues, Olivia Chow, who was our critic at the time, for her “remarkable diligence” in working with you and the government to amend Bill C-11 and limit the number of fraudulent applications and reduce the backlog in Canada's immigration system.

Ms. Chow said at the time that “Canada will finally get a refugee reform package that is both fast and fair”. It seemed everyone was happy. We all put a little water in our wine and, to quote you, “found a very reasonable compromise”. In fact, it was described as nothing short of a miracle. The compromises made the government's legislation acceptable. These included establishing a panel of experts to determine safe countries, allowing access to appeal for designated nationals and those from designated safe countries, and having greater timelines to start the appeal process.

Bill C-31 repeals almost all of those compromises and it would seem that you have gone back on your word, Minister. So the question is what changed, Minister? Why is your government using its majority to undo this reasonable compromise that everyone agreed was working?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

I promise not to. Well, I'll try not to.

Thank you very much, Chair.

Thank you, colleagues for your study of Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, the Marine Transportation Security Act and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Act.

Canadians should take great pride in the fact that we are recognized around the world as a compassionate and generous country. Polls consistently demonstrate that a majority of Canadians, both those born in Canada as well as immigrants, view immigration as a positive contribution to our country.

Canadians recognize the many benefits that immigration brings to our country, but they have no tolerance for those who seek to take advantage of that generosity. People who abuse our generous immigration and refugee programs undermine the integrity of the entire system and public confidence in it.

It's clear that some people have taken notice of our country's generosity, and they have learned that they can use the immigration system to their advantage. The fact that Canada now receives more refugee claims from the European Union than it does from Africa or Asia is, I think, evidence of that, particularly given that virtually none of those European asylum claimants are found to be in need of our protection.

The simple fact of the matter is that we spend far too many tax dollars on applicants who are not in need of our protection, but who come here to access our social benefits because we do nothing to stop them or even dissuade them from doing so.

In introducing Bill C-31, our rationale is simple. By focusing the resources of our system on providing protection to those who genuinely need it, we will improve our ability to help those people. But we can only focus our resources on genuine refugees by fixing the system to make it clear that abuse will not be tolerated.

With Parliament's passing of the Balanced Refugee Reform Act in June 2010, we made some progress towards this goal, but gaps remain in the new system.

The arrival of the Ocean Lady and Sun Sea confirmed that Canada has also become a target for the lucrative criminal enterprise of human smuggling. Human smuggling is also suspected in the most recent tragedy, which involved the deaths of four passengers on board the SV Tabasco 2 off the coast of Nova Scotia.

The crime of human smuggling is conducted by individuals whose only concern is their profits; they have no regard for human life or the safety of their passengers. As the Prime Minister has said, human smugglers are some of the world's worst criminals—people who profit from exploiting the miseries and aspirations of some of the world's most vulnerable people.

Bill C-31 will enable us to punish human smugglers and make it easy to prosecute them. It will create disincentives that will reduce the attraction of coming to Canada via a human smuggling operation, which will save lives.

Finally, it will ensure the government can fulfill its responsibility to ensure that foreign nationals who are inadmissible, or who may pose a threat to Canadians, can be properly identified and assessed for risk so that we can take appropriate action.

Let's be clear that Bill C-31 would allow Canada to maintain the most generous refugee system in the world. Right now we are a world leader in the number of convention refugees we resettle. Canada welcomes one of the highest numbers of refugees per capita, and this legislation will not change that. In fact, concurrent with these reforms to our asylum system, we are increasing our targeted number of resettled refugees by 20% so that we will be the number one recipient of resettled refugees worldwide. Of course, we're also increasing their integration support through the refugee assistance program.

Essentially this bill will make Canada's refugee system faster and fairer. It will speed up the process for deciding refugee claims. This will allow us to provide better protection more quickly to those who are truly in need of it.

Under the UN convention on refugees, our legal and moral obligation is clear. We have an obligation not to return people to a country where they have a well-founded fear of persecution due to race, national religion, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group. Under Bill C-31 we will continue to meet and exceed these obligations.

Let me quickly run through the major components of the legislation.

First, claimants from designated countries—those that reality and experience show do not normally produce genuine refugees—would have limited access to the recourse mechanisms that currently enable them to delay their removal from Canada for years. They would all continue to have access to full, fact-based hearings before independent decision-makers at the Immigration and Refugee Board on the unique merits of their claims, with no negative prejudice associated with their claims because they may come from designated countries.

This means that a claimant from a designated country who receives a negative decision from the IRB will not have access to the new refugee appeal division we are creating as a result of Bill C-11 in the last Parliament. They would continue to be able to ask the Federal Court to review a negative decision, but they would not benefit from an automatic stay of their removal during that time.

The United Nations has long praised Canada for the generosity of our current refugee system. The UNHCR has also recognized the validity of expedited processing for claimants from safe countries of origin. In fact, the former UNHCR representative to Canada, Abraham Abraham, said:

UNHCR does not oppose the introduction of a “designated” or “safe country or origin” list as...a procedural tool to prioritize or accelerate examination of applications

I would note that my department's data suggest that over that past three years the majority of failed EU claimants have not asked the Federal Court to review the IRB's negative decisions on their claims, because the vast majority have abandoned or withdrawn their own claims, indicating of their own volition that they do not need our protection.

This suggests that failed claimants would not even attempt to access the additional level of appeal provided under the RAD, even if they had access. And don't forget, should any EU country become a designated country, failed claimants could still seek relief from the federal court to appeal a negative decision.

On the topic of irregular arrivals and human smuggling, Bill C-31 maintains all of the measures contained in the former Bill C-4. Importantly, however, we have proposed a new measure that would exempt minors under the age of 16 from the mandatory detention provision.

I should also note that foreign nationals who arrive as part of an irregular arrival with the documents required for entry to Canada will not be subject to the mandatory detention provision, as long as they are not found to be otherwise inadmissible under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

While detention could last as long as one year, designated foreign nationals would be released sooner should they receive a positive determination on their refugee claim by the IRB or if they apply for and receive release from the Minister of Public Safety based on exceptional circumstances. For individuals who are held up for up to 12 months, the IRB will review their detention at that point and regularly afterwards at six-month intervals.

Mr. Chairman, the protection of our borders and of Canadians is our highest obligation, and we are making these changes because they are necessary. The current detention review periods under IRPA were not designed to deal with mass arrivals or the sorts of cases involving complex human smuggling operations of the scale that have recently targeted Canada.

Sophisticated transnational human smuggling ventures are frequently launched from areas of the world where terrorist and criminal organizations are known to be active. Passengers on board these ventures often arrive without proper documentation. In these circumstances, the task of distinguishing legitimate refugees from those who may pose a public safety threat creates a serious challenge. The processing of irregular mass arrivals, therefore, takes a lot of time. Put into very simple terms, human smuggling operations are difficult to investigate.

I wish to underline that detention will allow for a full and proper investigation of a migrant's identity and a determination of whether an individual is indeed admissible to Canada, as well as any risks they may pose to Canadians. After all, it is the government's duty to assess whether those who seek entry to Canada are inadmissible for reasons of serious criminality, security, health, or other grounds.

The alternative is to release everyone into Canadian communities before we have identified them, conducted security assessments, or determined whether they are genuine refugees, and then hope that the bad guys, who are not admissible to Canada, show up for their hearings and don't simply disappear underground. That would be irresponsible.

The government's duty to protect the safety and security of Canadians has been recognized by the Federal Court, by the Supreme Court. In fact, in one of the cases following the arrival of the Ocean Lady, the Federal Court said:While the importance of not unduly detaining such persons cannot be forgotten, the protection of Canadians and Canada’s pressing interest in securing its borders are also worthy considerations.... In cases of mass arrivals from some parts of the world it may well take several months for the Minister to complete an investigation, particularly where the identity of the individuals is in issue.

The proposed amendments respond to a harmful practice that has numerous negative consequences. Large-scale organized smuggling ventures like the ones that have targeted Canada in recent years threaten the integrity of our system. Smuggling ventures also jeopardize the health and lives of those smuggled into Canada.

First, smugglers make unfair and untruthful promises to those who are smuggled. In many cases, passengers hand over all of their life savings to their smuggler on the false promise that when they arrive in Canada their affairs will be in order. The smuggling journey itself can result in the death of some passengers. Every year thousands of people die in smuggling operations around the world.

I should be clear that in the case of the two large marine arrivals that have been the focus of public attention, we believe that in most cases people paid around $5,000 Canadian as a down payment, with an obligation to pay up to $40,000 upon arrival, over time—essentially in an indentured context—to the smuggling syndicate's representatives in Canada. To me that is where smuggling can actually turn into a form of trafficking.

Essentially, there are three principal challenges contained in this bill to address human smuggling. First, we would broaden the offence of human smuggling in two specific ways. We would further expand the offence to capture the various ways it can be committed. We also add the element of recklessness to the offence.

Under section 117 of IRPA, the offence currently states:No person shall knowingly organize, induce, aid or abet the coming into Canada of one or more persons who are not in possession of a visa, passport or other document required by this Act.

I underline this because sometimes in debate we've heard people say that coming as a prospective asylum claimant through a smuggling operation is just a normal form of migration and not a problem.

No. It violates multiple laws, including IRPA in several respects, such as in section 117.

With our proposed changes, the offence would read that no person shall commit this offence either “knowing that, or being reckless as to whether, their coming into Canada is or would be in contravention of this Act”. Broadening the offence of human smuggling will give police and prosecutors the flexibility they require to respond to all forms of human smuggling.

Secondly, this legislation would create mandatory minimum penalties that target the most egregious forms of human smuggling and that reflect the objectives I have already discussed. These mandatory minimum penalties send an unequivocal message that such conduct will not be tolerated.

Finally, we're taking steps to hold shipowners accountable by increasing the penalties for offences under the Marine Transportation Security Act.

These criminal law improvements are a critical component of our overall response to human smuggling, but they should not be considered in isolation. In order to be effective and adequately address the crime of smuggling, each of these amendments is designed to work together with the others.

With this bill, we also seek to discourage passengers from using the services of a human smuggler by introducing several disincentives. First, we would also impose a five-year ban on applications for permanent resident status for persons who are part of a designated irregular arrival. Without the ability to become a permanent resident for five years, these individuals would also be unable to sponsor their family members to come to Canada during that period.

I think this is probably the single most important element of the bill in deterring smuggling. It will change the economic calculation for prospective clients of smuggling syndicates if they realize they will not be able to have family members in Canada assisting them and paying off their debts to the syndicate.

We believe these changes are fair and are necessary to deter passengers from using this dangerous form of travel to Canada. I also wish to remind you once again that all eligible claimants would continue to be entitled to a fair and independent hearing before the IRB, without a negative prejudice associated with their claim.

At the same time I recognize that there have been some criticisms of this legislation and some of the provisions I've just described. As I indicated, as we move forward with this legislation I am open to considering all reasonable suggestions from the committee as to how we can improve the integrity of our system and focus it on legitimate refugees.

On that I want to say that in the last Parliament we demonstrated openness to reasonable amendments, but in my view those amendments have to achieve the objective of discouraging smuggling and false asylum claims.

Finally, as you know, the bill includes provisions for legal authorization for the government to collect biometric data from applicants for temporary residency status. I can address that at greater length during the question period, but we believe it will facilitate an improvement by orders of magnitude in our immigration security screening. It constitutes an essential element of the beyond the borders agreement signed between President Obama and our government.

Mr. Chair, I'm happy to take your questions.

In closing, I believe this bill strikes the appropriate balance between reinforcing the integrity of our system, dissuading those who seek to abuse it, but also ensuring protection for those who are bona fide victims of persecution, in the best traditions of Canada's humanitarian instincts.

Thank you very much.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to enter the debate on Bill C-31. The Liberal Party believes that it is very reasonable to review, consult on and update refugee and immigration laws from time to time in order to address ways in which they may no longer meet the public interest, address issues that have come up since the last revisions and make improvements. The Liberal Party supports that, but Bill C-31, unfortunately, has some very serious flaws.

The fact that the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism is the only person who will decide what countries of origin are safe will mean that there is no accountability and no recourse available, and the refugee system will become dangerously politicized.

We see that playing out from accounts in the media about the immigration minister himself and funds potentially being used to organize partisan fundraising from immigrant communities. It is a very dangerous precedent.

The goal is to give one person in this country the power to determine which people will be eligible to claim refugee status and which people will not.

That is dangerous.

This bill will allow the Minister of Public Safety to decide which groups of people are irregular arrivals, and thus gives him too much discretion but no accountability.

The elimination of an appeal process for people who come from a country on the safe country list or for people designated as part of an irregular arrival does not guarantee that the law will be applied uniformly.

Our party opposes long-term detention without warrant, and opposes an unfair review process where the first examination is not held for 12 months. The proposed policies amount to cruel and unusual punishment.

It is clear that, while supporting improvements to make the laws more timely, more fair and more effective, there are many ways in which these are dangerous changes that put unaccountable power in the hands of ministers who have, allegedly, been abusing that power.

The Liberals believe that creating two classes of refugees is not acceptable and that the bill undermines the compassion and support Canada has historically provided to those seeking refuge from situations of risk, danger and abuse in their home country. It punishes selected refugees both by branding them in negative ways as security risks when, in most cases, that is not the case, and by locking them up for long periods of time and treating them much more harshly. This punishing of refugees is an unacceptable way of reforming our system and very likely open to charter challenges.

I will talk about two parts of the context of this.

My daughter was in Sri Lanka seven years ago at the time of the tsunami, which was a humanitarian disaster of massive proportions in Sri Lanka. She was, fortunately, not harmed. She was part of a convoy of aid that citizens had pulled together to drive down in trucks to the areas most affected. What she told us when she came back was that it was extremely dangerous. There were huge security measures that the group needed to take. These convoys of aid were at risk of being hijacked by government forces and by Tamil forces at various times. It was a dangerous situation where there was a civil war and the Tamil citizens were victimized by forces in their own country.

A few years later, the civil war came to a head. There were reports in 2009 that 10,000 citizens were killed and that 280,000 Tamil citizens were displaced in their own country and living in refugee camps. That is the framing for the arrival in British Columbia.

As the member for Parliament for Vancouver Quadra and a British Columbian, I was aware of the humanitarian disaster leading to people leaving the country and coming as refugees to Canada at that time. One boat arrived in October 2009 and a further boat arrived shortly thereafter.

I have an interesting analysis of the arrival of the boat bringing Tamil community members whose lives had been at risk, whose family members had been probably killed by either the government or Tamil rebel forces and who literally were the kind of humanitarian asylum seekers who Canada has a responsibility to accept and to support and has done so successfully in the past.

I will read a couple of sentences from the abstract of the analysis in the Canadian Journal of Communication, No. 4, 2011, by Ashley Bradimore and Harald Bauder of Ryerson University. This analysis looks at 32 articles. It does a careful analysis to ensure that this is a representative sample of the articles in the Vancouver Sun, Toronto Star and National Post. It analyzes the framing, representation and identity in these articles, showing that there was an overall negative representation of the Tamil refugees. The press emphasized issues of criminality and terrorism and constructed the refugees as being a risk. The sentences read:

The discussion established security—rather than human rights—as a focal point and portrayed the immigration system as both “failing” and “abused” by “bogus claimants”.

This security-oriented framework provided a discursive background for the refugee reform Bill C-11, Bill C-11, which has been replaced by Bill C-31.

We see a context in the discussions across national discussions that are not talking about the humanitarian issue or the situation with people arriving from Sri Lanka in these Tamil boats. The discussion centres on illegality and a lot of negatives. In fact, the analysis of the news articles at the time showed that some 66% of the articles sampled had negative terms in the headlines to describe the events, such as “terrorism”, “suspected”, “illegal”, “apprehended”. That is how between 50% and 67% of the headlines characterized the situation of the Tamil refugees coming to British Columbia.

Why was it characterized so negatively? Was that just the media portraying refugees from a known n country where there had been abuses and humanitarian tragedies? Was the media just being negative or was there a government hand in all of this?

It turns out that, in this analysis of articles, between 50% and 68% of the quotes and references in these articles were either from government sources or the police. The government sources were very widely quoted in these articles. What is the significance of that? It turns out that the immigration minister of the day came out very early on with some very negative comments. For example, the minister signalled, “there should be no rush to unconditionally embrace as refugees the 76 men, believed to be from Sri Lanka”. Another one reads, “We obviously don't want to encourage people to get into rickety boats, pay thousands of dollars, cross the oceans and come to Canada illegally”.

Another one reads:

Without prejudice to this particular group of people, [...]

We want to ensure that we don't end up with a two-tier immigration system, one tier for legal law-abiding immigrants who wait patiently to come to Canada the legal way, and another that [encourages] false refugee claimants to come through the back door.

These comments played a significant role in changing the discourse in the media from what was once centred on the humanitarian to talking about illegality, the bogus and queue jumping. That then becomes the basis for putting forward Bill C-31, which is an attack on refugees. First the Conservatives lull the public and then they attack the refugees, perhaps with impunity. However, the Liberals will be speaking out against it.

[Dan Harris, NDP, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it was very interesting to hear the government House leader say that a committee should be allowed to complete its work before decisions are made. That is the situation on Bill C-31 with respect to biometrics. A committee was engaged in a study to discuss the facts and meet with experts and witnesses in order to reach a decision on biometrics. However, the Conservatives just shot that out the cannon and are now proceeding with this bill before the committee's work is done.

Of course, it is always a pleasure to stand in this House, but I wish we were debating a bill that I would be able to support.

The title of Bill C-31, protecting Canada's immigration system act, is an improper and inaccurate title because rather than protect it, it would do damage to Canada's immigration system legally, socially, morally and internationally.

New Democrats strongly oppose Bill C-31 because it would punish refugees instead of ensuring a fast and fair refugee system.

This is not the first bill this Parliament has seen that targets the wrong group. I would point to Bill C-4, which I spoke up about several months ago, which has now been rolled into this bill.

I would like to sincerely thank my colleague, the member for Vancouver Kingsway, for his hard work and leadership on this file.

I want to talk about the omnibus nature of the bill which, from a structural point of view, is something that is a disturbing recurring feature of the Conservative government's legislation.

Bill C-31 is an omnibus refugee reform bill that combines the worst parts of former Bill C-11 from the last Parliament with Bill C-4 from this Parliament.

We saw this strategy before when the government put nine separate pieces of serious and complex crime legislation into one omnibus bill which it then put out for discussion and debate, therefore denying parliamentarians the opportunity to properly debate the merits of each individual bill.

Now the minister is combining two separate major pieces of legislation, as well as another serious issue, that of biometrics, into one unwieldy bill.

For Canadians who may be watching the debate, I want to explain what those bills are.

Bill C-11 was introduced in the last Parliament. It was debated, went through committee, was amended and passed in this very House. It went through all three readings in the other place, passed, received royal assent and was waiting to be implemented in June. Now, by introducing this bill, the minister has stopped that bill from being implemented. That bill was geared toward reforming Canada's refugee system.

When speaking to that bill on Tuesday, June 15, 2010, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism stated:

We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

These amendments, I am happy to say, create a reform package that is both faster and fairer than the bill as it was originally tabled.

The minister has now gone back to the original bill and thrown out all the wonderful hard work done by parliamentarians and the amendments that he lauded as faster and fairer than the original bill, the very bill he said was inferior to the amendments that were made by all parties in the House. It baffles me that the minister has yet to explain his reasoning behind this.

One of the first bills the Conservatives introduced, and one of the first pieces of legislation that I spoke to was Bill C-4. Now the minister has wrapped that bill into Bill C-31. There is no explanation as to why he would do that to a bill which had already been introduced and was moving through the system. This slows the bill down and puts it back at the start of the legislative process.

As I am opposed to the original bill, I do not necessarily mind that it will take longer before it becomes law, but it is certainly a waste of our time and taxpayers' money.

Bill C-4 has been plainly condemned by virtually every group and stakeholder involved in the immigration system in this country: lawyers, refugee groups, churches, immigrant settlement services across the board, and, I might add, a great number of my constituents.

The government has rolled everything into one bill and has added one more controversial issue that deserves its own debate. The government has added the issue of biometrics to the bill.

The Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration held meetings and was in the middle of an important study on biometrics when the government introduced this legislation that steps on the very thing it is supposed to be studying. Sadly, it is no great surprise to me that the Conservatives moved on this before the facts were in and the work was completed. It is a little haphazard and half-baked like a lot of things they propose.

What does this say about the government's view of the work of standing committees and the experts and witnesses who appear before committees when the government reaches conclusions before the committee members have heard all the evidence? We would not accept it in a court room and we should not accept it here. That is one among many of the problems the government has.

One of my major concerns is the excessive power that the bill gives to the minister. The minister has the discretion to designate countries of origin or safe countries, to designate a group as an irregular arrival and determine what conditions would be placed on those designated refugee claimants. The designations have serious consequences and there should be oversight in making these determinations. Designated countries of origin would be countries that the minister believes do not produce legitimate refugees, usually because they are developed democracies.

The minister has thrown out the panel of experts to advise him, and I ask why. If the minister is so confident that he can choose which countries are safe countries, why would he not want the benefit of advice from experts in human rights? He praised this very idea as a good one 18 months ago. He still has not explained himself.

The Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism may have great faith in his own judgment, but to have one person make such important determinations as to which country is safe or not, which country is or is not capable of producing refugees, and who is an irregular arrival is extremely troubling and sets a dangerous precedent. That is too much power for one person to have. It sounds to me that he is creating his own little PMO of control in immigration. We should build in checks and balances. That should be the case no matter who the minister of immigration is, even a New Democrat after we form government in 2015. I do not know who would make the argument that the system is not better served by having that kind of check and balance in place.

With regard to the DCOs, the bill removes the requirement that a determination be made by a panel including human rights experts. By concentrating the power to designate a country in the minister's hands, it opens the prospect that decisions could be made for political and/or foreign policy reasons and considerations. Thus, these designations by the minister create two classes of refugees.

Refugee claimants from DCOs would face a much faster determination process and faster deportation for failed claims. An initial form must be filled out and submitted within 15 days of the claim. DCO claims submitted in Canada would be decided within 30 days, DCO claims submitted at a port of entry would be decided within 45 days. All others would be decided within 60 days. Failed DCO claimants could be removed from Canada almost immediately, even if they have asked for judicial review. In other words, a person could be removed before the review is even heard and that is unacceptable to me and to the members on this side of the House.

Furthermore, DCO claimants have no access to the new refugee appeal division. Herein lies what is fundamentally backward about the bill. The accelerated timelines make it difficult for people to get proper legal representation. This could lead to mistakes and subsequently a negative decision. Legal experts have warned that these accelerated timeframes and restricted access to the refugee appeal division would create an unfair system. The effect of the accelerated deportation would mean that people would already be removed from the country before the legal process had run its course. We know that once people have been removed it is much more difficult to get them back here if they are legitimate claimants.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments and question from the hon. member. It is correct. Under the former bill, Bill C-11, there was a panel of experts, including human rights experts, that could make decisions about a safe country. This would now be put into the hands of the minister. It is just further evidence of the concerns we have about the bill, which focuses more decision making and power, in a political sense, in the minister's office other than through an independent expert advisory situation.

What we had before was far superior to what is now contemplated in the bill.

Why would we have a minister making those determinations about what would be a safe country when we could have reliable, independent experts doing that and giving reasonable advice? Again, it is further evidence that the bill is fundamentally flawed and we should not approve it.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to Bill C-31. However, I would have preferred that this bill not be introduced at all and that we not debate it. In my opinion, this is an objectionable bill. There are a number of problems with it and it is certainly going to result in legal challenges.

I would like to start by saying that Bill C-31 builds on Bill C-11, which was introduced in the previous Parliament. With a minority government, the Conservatives were unable to pass the strict and severe bills that they wanted. Now, they are taking Bill C-49, which was also from the previous Parliament, and making the necessary changes to complete their biased and discriminatory immigration policy the sole purpose of which is to close our borders for as long as possible to foreigners seeking asylum in Canada.

The change in this government's tone on immigration and citizenship is striking. Most of Bill C-31 is practically copied word for word from the former Bill C-49, the short title of which was Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act. It was promoted as the bill that would protect refugees and discourage smugglers who were endangering the lives of foreigners trying to enter Canada by boat. Bill C-31, which is pretty much the same, is entitled Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act. The image is eloquent.

The Conservatives are now showing their true colours. The intent of Bill C-31 is no longer to protect refugees, but to protect the integrity of Canada's immigration system against ill-intentioned refugees who abuse the generosity of Canadian laws and who try to take advantage of our country. These comments were made and repeated by the previous speaker.

In the previous Parliament, some immigration bills, especially, Bills C-11 and C-35, were passed after much discussion, debate and compromise by all parties. A compromise was even reached on Bill C-49, the predecessor to Bill C-31. This time, the Conservative government is no longer receptive to amendments. On the contrary, the minister himself said that there are gaps in the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and that Canada needs stronger measures that are closer to the original bill we introduced in March 2010.

This time, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism is not honouring the agreements reached by the various parties.

At the time, a number of groups that defend rights and freedoms condemned Bill C-49. Amnesty International, the Canadian Council for Refugees, the Barreau du Québec and Professor Peter Showler, to name just a few, roundly condemned several key provisions of the bill, saying that they represented a serious violation of Canada's international and constitutional obligations.

In fact, this government is still using the pretext of national security to justify its lack of transparency and its desire to keep people in need out of the country, with no regard for Canada's constitutional and international obligations.

Far from having improved his bill in response to the criticisms about humanitarian considerations in previous bills, the minister instead says that he will not give in to the “immigration industry” lobby whose criticisms only reinforce the idea that the government is truly on the right track. It would be hard to be any more arrogant.

In addition to the government's arrogance, its narrow vision and demagoguery must be condemned.

With this bill, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism is creating a new category of immigrants and giving himself the power to arbitrarily impose a different processing system for those immigrants than for other asylum seekers. This discretionary power is, in fact, the power to declare the entry of foreign nationals into the country as irregular by using loosely defined criteria based on national security interests, which was probably the genesis for the idea that this power cannot be delegated.

The creation of this category of refugee was specifically designed to block the entry of as many refugees as possible and it completely disregards the right to equality under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. These asylum seekers often come from countries where fundamental rights are denied and where living conditions jeopardize their health and lives.

It is utterly ridiculous, even irresponsible, for a government to arbitrarily punish refugees who arrive by boat on the pretext of wanting to separate the good refugees from the bad as quickly as possible. That makes no sense. A refugee is not a qualified immigrant who can be selected. We cannot select refugees, simply by virtue of their refugee status. According to this government's logic, refugees who are not selected are bad refugees.

The fact that the minister would be able to create two classes of people is unacceptable and downright disturbing. Human beings are all equal, and the minister must never forget that Canada has a legal responsibility toward these people under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and a moral responsibility arising from its international obligations under various human rights treaties.

According to Peter Showler, director of the Refugee Forum and former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, concerns about a deluge of illegal refugees are unfounded because both routes to obtaining refugee protection—the Refugee and Humanitarian Resettlement Program, which targets international refugees as defined by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and Canada's Inland Refugee Protection System for refugees arriving in Canada spontaneously—have historically been responsible for the same number of permanent residents in Canada, around 12,000 per year.

The difference between the two systems is control: control over the number of people coming in, the selection criteria, and the procedures and processing times. This is a legitimate concern, but it should not legitimize the crass justifications that the government is using to block access for people who need help.

For example, the minister claims that Canada is getting more and more claims from certain countries, such as Hungary and Mexico, and that these claims often come from “bad refugees” who do not really need protection. According to Mr. Showler, the Immigration and Refugee Board nevertheless accepts a significant number of claims from those two countries, 17% and 8%, respectively.

The minister also claims that this new bill will enable the board to do some “housecleaning” and shorten the waiting list for “good refugees” who have to wait patiently in refugee camps because illegitimate refugees who arrive by boat bog the system down by using fraudulent documents to get into Canada.

That, according to Mr. Showler, is not true because, on the one hand, not all refugees abroad can reach refugee camps, and on the other hand, the United Nations convention recognizes that it is difficult for refugees to be granted asylum, so it allows them to use fraudulent documents to seek refugee protection.

The Conservatives are trying to create an unhealthy climate around immigration, and specifically refugees. The executive of the Canadian Council for Refugees is very concerned about this and stated, “it is very worrisome when the government tries to create an anti-refugee sentiment among the population”. Several statements made by government MPs have promoted that very sentiment.

According to Wanda Yamamoto, president of the Canadian Council for Refugees, “the bill is discriminatory and creates a two-tier system of refugee protection in Canada. It also makes it dangerously vulnerable to political considerations, rather than ensuring a fair and independent decision about who is a refugee. Our refugee system needs to give everyone a fair hearing, based on the facts of their case and regardless of their country of origin.”

Determining refugee status will henceforth be directly controlled by the minister, who now has the power to establish his own criteria. Janet Dench of the Canadian Council for Refugees said, “there is an arbitrary element in this, which the government is exploiting and abusing.”

Politicizing the immigration system is a very dangerous thing to do. The system had found a rather fair balance between security and individual liberties. All of that is now being compromised in the name of national security. From now on, any difficulty identifying refugees will be considered a threat to national security and, as a result, will justify different, more severe and punitive treatment than for all other kinds of refugees.

The Canadian Bar Association stated that Bill C-31 lacks clear qualitative thresholds and raises serious concern about excessive ministerial discretion. Furthermore, given the serious legal consequences that flow from a designation made by the minister, these amendments are overbroad and unsustainable.

Executive officers of the Canadian Bar Association went even further and recommended that implementation of the proposed changes be delayed to allow for immediate and meaningful consultation with all stakeholders.

I have only touched on some of the important aspects that support dropping this bill. We have asked the government many times to drop Bill C-31. This bill fuels an anti-refugee sentiment and exacerbates fears that are often legitimate, but that are being misguided with a bill like this one.

I think it is a shame that we are voting on this bill this evening with yet another time allocation. The NDP cannot vote in favour of Bill C-31.

We will strongly condemn this bill.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and for the Asia-Pacific Gateway]

Mr. Speaker, I am grateful to have this opportunity to join the debate on Bill C-31, protecting Canada's immigration system act, which would further improve Canada's refugee determination system, as well as our immigration system.

I think we can all agree that Canada has one of the most generous and fair refugee systems in the world. In fact, the facts speak for themselves. Canada currently welcomes one out of every ten resettled refugees worldwide. Since World War II, Canada has provided a safe haven to more than one million refugees and our humanitarian efforts have been recognized by the United Nations.

Canadians can take great pride in the openness and welcoming nature of our refugee system. At the same time, few Canadians would disagree that the system is badly in need of reform. As we see time and time again, refugee claimants wait too long for a decision on a claim. This puts in limbo those who are genuinely in need of Canada's protection but it also allows those who are not really in need of our protection to abuse our generosity and take unfair advantage of our country.

Last year, processing times for a decision on a claim before the independent Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, the IRB, could take more than 20 months and, because of the seemingly endless recourses available, it can take an average of four and a half years from the time a claim is made until a failed refugee claimant has exhausted all legal avenues and is removed from Canada. In some cases, it has taken more than a decade.

As one can imagine, these long delays, as well as access to generous taxpayer funded health and social benefits, encourage individuals who are not in need of our protection to use the refugee system as a way to remain in Canada for years on end.

To address these problems, Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, was passed in June 2010. That legislation included a number of improvements to the refugee system to provide for faster protection and faster removals with the aim of deterring abuse.

Bill C-11 provided for faster processing timelines to quickly decide claims. It introduced a designated country of origin policy to further expedite the processing of claims from those countries. It also restricted access to post-claim recourses to allow for faster removals for claimants not found in need of protection.

However, as we proceeded with the implementation of that bill, it became clear that further reforms were needed. We are concerned, for example, that we are receiving a large number of refugee claims from countries where human and democratic rights exist and which are not typically refugee-producing, such as those in the European Union. If members can believe it, Canada actually receives more refugee claims from the democratic European Union than from Africa or Asia. What is more, in recent years, virtually all European Union claims were abandoned, withdrawn or rejected. If that trend continues, that means that the unfounded claims from the 5,800 EU nationals who sought asylum last year will cost Canadian taxpayers nearly $170 million.

When we consider that 62% of all asylum claims were either abandoned, withdrawn or rejected by the IRB last year, it becomes clear that too many tax dollars are spent on these claimants and on tax-funded social benefits.

We need to send a message to those who would abuse Canada's generous refugee system that if they are not in need of protection they will be sent home quickly. At the same time, those who truly need our protection will get it even faster, while providing an extra level of appeal to most failed claimants.

That is why the Government of Canada introduced Bill C-31, which we are debating today, which will, if passed, further strengthen the asylum system and deter abuse. I will be very clear about one thing. Under these new measures, all eligible refugee claimants would continue to be entitled to a fair hearing before an independent decision-maker.

To begin, we propose to eliminate the information-gathering interview that was developed under the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and replace it with a basis of claim. This document would be submitted at the same time as the eligibility interview for those who make their claim inland or within 15 days for those who make their claim at the port of entry.

Under the proposed measures, refugee claimants, particularly those from designated countries of origin, would receive a hearing before the IRB more quickly. Hearings at the IRB for claimants from designated countries of origin would occur within 30 to 45 days. Claimants who are not from designated countries of origin would also have their hearing timelines accelerated. It is proposed that these hearings would be scheduled within 60 days of being referred to the IRB.

However, to be effective, faster decisions on refugee claims must be complemented by timely removals. Quick removals would contribute to reducing overall costs associated with Canada's refugee system by deterring abuse. Under a reformed refugee status determination system, the Canada Border Services Agency would place a higher priority on apprehending and removing failed refugee claimants. In particular, the CBSA would remove failed refugee claimants within 12 months following a final negative decision by the IRB.

As we know all too well, failed refugee claimants may turn to other options to delay their removal from Canada. That is why limits on other recourse options have been proposed in this legislation.

In closing, let me reiterate, the proposed protecting Canada's immigration system act builds on reform passed in June 2010 as part of the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. These new measures further accelerate the processing of refugee claims for nationals from designated countries which are those that generally do not produce refugees. In addition, the proposals reduce the options available to failed claimants to delay their removal from Canada.

Even after these changes, Canada's refugee determination system would continue to meet our domestic and international obligations.

This is what The Globe and Mail had to say about Bill C-31.

Immigration minister's...refugee reforms, aimed at making the process more efficient and decisive, are generally good. If implemented, they will improve an unwieldy asylum program....The legislation rightly focuses on weeding out claimants who are not genuine, and stemming the flow of asylum seekers from countries...that are democracies with respect for basic rights and freedoms....Fast-tracking refugee claims from these countries, and ensuring failed claimants are promptly deported, is an excellent way to ensure Canada does not become a magnet for abuse. The bill will also implement biometric identification, such as fingerprints and photos, for people who apply for visitor's visas. This welcome change will guard against the use of false identities.

I urge all hon. members of this House to join me in supporting Bill C-31 in order to deter abuse of our refugee system, and provide a quicker and more secure beginning for victims of violence and persecution around the world.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

—fact-based claim on the merits of their claim at the IRB. There is no refugee appeal division for any claimant now. The creation of the refugee appeal division, which will be available to the vast majority of failed claimants, is a new provision that we did not initially propose in Bill C-11 in 2010.

[Nycole Turmel, NDP, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It is a pleasure to be with you.

I want to ask a question of the minister. Under Bill C-11 you had an independent committee with a role to establish safe countries. At the time, you said this was a great idea. I want to quote what you said at that time:

Regulations would also require that a designation can only be made if an advisory panel including at least two independent human rights experts recommends it.

These amendments go a long way in providing greater clarity and transparency around the process of designation.

Now this is part of Bill C-31, as you know very well, so here's what I want to know. Were you wrong at the time on the clarity and transparency when you said it, or are you wrong not to remove it...? So one way or the other....

[Ève Péclet, NDP, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, when it comes to the European Union, I am fully aware of the situation. I travelled to Europe myself and heard from many countries about this. Canada is having problems with claims from only two countries, and yes, most of those claims are not legitimate.

However, Mr. Minister, you know very well that Bill C-11 solved all of those problems and that negotiations were held with the opposition. Now that you have a majority, you are pointing the finger at the NDP.

Will you negotiate with us? No. Will you include the amendments that were proposed in this bill? No. So, we will not take any lessons from you, simply because you claim we do not know this bill. We know very well that you will do whatever you want, but this is a mistake.

You have problems, but this bill does not solve them. Stop generalizing the situation by saying that we are going to be overrun with refugees from all over the world. We are having problems with only two European Union countries. This does not mean we should penalize refugees from everywhere else.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to this punish refugees and give a break to smugglers bill. Why do I say that? Even though this bill is supposed to go after smugglers, the people who would be hurt are the genuine refugees.

Two weekends ago we celebrated St. Patrick's Day. I was thinking about the Irish refugees who came to the shores of Toronto. At the turn of the century, over 50,000 Irish refugees arrived on the shores of what was the city of York, before it was called Toronto. At that time, the city of York had only 30,000 residents.

How did the Irish refugees arrive? By irregular means, by boats. Did they have any identification with them? Most likely not. Should they have been locked up? Under this law, if passed, I suppose they would have been locked up for at least a year.

Members can imagine refugees coming to the shores of a big country, to a city that does not have a lot of people, and being locked up for a year. A lot of them were sick. Who would have been able to help them? At the time, the medical officer of health risked his life to serve the Irish immigrants. In fact, a doctor lost his life due to a fever. What was shown to the Irish refugees was compassion and support. As a result, they built Toronto. They helped build Canada. Some of their descendants might even be in the House of Commons.

Had they been locked up, they would not have been able to work or support their families. Under the law that is in front of us, they would not have been able to sponsor their family members to bring them here. They would have been separated from their families for at least 10 years. Because they would have been locked up, they would not have been able to work. After they were released, assuming they were genuine refugees, they still would not have been able to become permanent residents for a long period of time. They would have been prevented from sponsoring their family members. Even after they had become permanent residents, their status could still have been revoked. What kind of stability would their lives have had? None whatsoever.

At the time, if Ireland had been seen as a safe country, many of those refugees would have been sent home.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees' recommendation indicates that some countries are safer than others, but we have to determine each refugee's claim based on the person's circumstances. Some countries are considered safe countries, so to speak, but not for gay, lesbian and bisexual people. They could be gay bashed or killed.

How does one declare a country as safe? The previous law said that there would be an advisory committee made up of a team of experts who would advise the minister. This bill just got rid of that. The minister does not need any expert advice. He can just declare a country as safe and the people from that country would be fast-tracked for deportation in no time, without right of appeal to the Federal Court, and no humanitarian or compassionate consideration. They could attempt an appeal, but it would not stop them from being deported. That means individual refugees would not be treated equally under the law.

In Canada we have a fundamental belief that each case must be considered equally under the law. The bill would completely change that. It would treat refugee A completely differently from refugee B depending upon the person's country of origin. However, let us assume it is a gay man from a country such as Ghana or Jamaica. One could say that Jamaica is a safe country, yet people can be killed because of their sexual orientation.

The bill has a lot of flaws. I do not understand why the bill is necessary. Less than a year ago, all parties in the House of Commons worked with the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration and came up with a package called the balanced refugee reform act. At that time, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration said that he was very proud of the bill because it had all-party support, was balanced and fair.

What has changed in the last eight or nine months? Nothing. Why is a bill that was balanced and fair all of a sudden no longer balanced and fair? Nothing has changed.

In fact, with regard to that bill, Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act, the immigration minister came to the committee and said, “This is such a fine bill. It will take us at a least a year to implement the bill. Give us one year and we will make the system perfect.” That is what was promised last June. It is not June 2012 yet. A year has not passed and the bill has not been implemented. The minister obviously has not had the time to implement the bill, and yet this so-called fast, balanced and fair bill all of a sudden became a big problem, and here we are debating another bill.

Think of the amount of money and time that has been wasted. A huge number of witnesses came to committee. There were forums in cities across the country. The immigration committee listened to all types of expert advice. All of that is gone. It is completely changed. The bill in front of us looks completely different. It is quite astounding. I cannot see what has changed in one year. The previous bill has not even been implemented and yet we are here wasting time and money debating a new bill.

What is the root problem? Why do we have such a backlog? Why does it take so long to determine a refugee claim?

Prior to 2006, the wait was one or two years. Things were going along and there were no huge problems. When the Conservatives came into power, they did not appoint any Immigration and Refugee Board members. As a result, for two or three years hardly any cases were being determined. A huge backlog was created because the Conservative minister did not appoint any IRB members.

It is the implementation of the law that is the problem. The law is not the problem.

On top of that, the CBSA said that it had difficulty deporting people because it does not have the right computer system. This is according to the Auditor General and admitted by the CBSA.

The real problem is the implementation of the law. There is no need to change the law. That is why members should not support this bill.

It is a very complex bill. I wish I had more time to address every element of it.

[Jean-François Fortin, Bloc, Haute-Gaspésie—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Mr. Speaker, before I begin talking about such an important matter as the status of refugees, I would like to say that it is good to be able to rise in the House and speak to one of this government's bills. Given the number of times that the Conservatives have invoked closure since the beginning of this parliament, Bloc Québécois members, and those of the other opposition parties, have been muzzled on too many issues affecting the interests and values of Quebec and Canadians. I am disappointed, but not surprised, because standing up for democracy is not the Conservatives' strong suit. Come to think of it, I find it difficult to come up with one area where they excel.

The bill we are debating touches on two aspects of my introduction that might seem to be off topic: Quebec values and the Conservatives' lack of regard for democracy. I said Quebec values, but I will correct myself. They are actually universal values.

Bill C-31, which we are debating today, takes a dim view of refugees, treating them like a burden and a potential threat. Nowhere in this document do we see the real will to help these people who have experienced real tragedy. According to the minister, they take advantage of our welcome and cost Canadians too much money.

While defending his bill, the minister said the following in February:

There is a whole narrative in the community about how they can come to Canada and benefit from social welfare and all kinds of other social programs, health insurance...

For too long, we have spent precious time and taxpayers' money on people who are not in need of our protection, at the expense of legitimate asylum seekers...

This smacks of avarice and prejudice.

This is how the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism explained and defended his Bill C-31 in the House on March 6:

Canadians are worried when they see large human smuggling operations, for example, the two large ships that arrived on Canada's west coast in the past two years with hundreds of passengers, illegal migrants who paid criminal networks to be brought to Canada in an illegal and very dangerous manner.

Canadians are also worried when they see a large number of false refugee claimants who do not need Canada's protection, but who file refugee claims because they see an opportunity in Canada's current refugee system to stay in Canada permanently and have access to social benefits...our country's protection.

Canadians are really worried about this, for crying out loud. If you want my opinion, this Conservative government is giving Canadians every reason to worry. They like it when people are worried because then they can justify military spending, trampling on people's rights and forcing the provinces to build jails. But this is about refugees, people who come here with nothing but their distress and desperation, not the economic immigrants who show up with half a million dollars. We are talking about people who are willing to risk their lives for a fresh start in Canada or Quebec.

In an attempt to justify his bill, the minister would have us believe that bogus refugees are flooding into Canada, that foreigners have figured out how to work the system: they pass themselves off as refugees so that they can take advantage of Canada's health insurance and social assistance systems. You would have to be awfully mean-spirited and ideological to say such crazy things. They are using exceptional cases to give themselves arbitrary powers that will have a direct impact on the lives of desperate people.

A document published in 2001 by the Inter-Parliamentary Union and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees states the following:

Unlike migrants, refugees do not choose to leave their countries; they are forced to do so. Economic migrants are persons who leave their countries of origin purely for economic reasons, to seek material improvements in their lives. The key difference between economic migrants and refugees is that economic migrants enjoy the protection of their home countries; refugees do not.

Bill C-31 fails to recognize the spirit of the Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees:

Considering that the United Nations has, on various occasions, manifested its profound concern for refugees and endeavoured to assure refugees the widest possible exercise of these fundamental rights and freedoms...

Where is that concern now? Where in Bill C-31 is the desire to assure those fundamental rights? They evaporated the moment the Conservatives got their majority. Gone, just like that.

There was Bill C-11, which was passed unanimously by this House. In a speech he gave on June 29, 2010, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism spoke glowingly about Bill C-11, and I quote:

Let me just close by once more thanking my colleagues in the opposition, my critics in particular who worked together with me in a remarkable act of cross-partisan collaboration to get things done for Canadians. As a result of their work we are seeing today what I think is a minor miracle. I came to this place three months ago to launch our Balanced Refugee Reform Act. We said at the time that we would listen to constructive ideas about how to improve the bill.

We did listen. We did consult. We had a remarkable cross-party consensus in the House of Commons and today in the Senate that will lead to a much better refugee system for Canada, a faster and fairer system, a system that provides enhanced procedural fairness for refugee claimants....

Now, out of partisanship and mean-spiritedness, the minister is throwing out Bill C-11, that minor miracle. Bill C-31 not only spoils the balance Bill C-11 achieved in terms of the procedure that should apply to refugee claimants, but it takes the Conservatives' twisted logic even further: it attacks the victims of human smugglers instead of the smugglers themselves by creating a subclass of refugees.

It is clear to the Bloc Québécois that the Conservatives are using Bill C-31 to send a message to people around the world who are persecuted that Canada no longer wants them. Frankly, this is disappointing.

I said at the beginning of my speech that standing up for democracy was not a Conservative value. This government is quite willing to stand up for the free market and rich oil companies, but standing up for people who are suffering, people who risk torture or death, people who do not think what the government would have them think, is the least of its concerns.

Bill C-31 reflects the government's desire to exercise power without sharing, even if it means destroying the consensus that was Bill C-11, because the opposition parties had a hand in it.

Bill C-31 exemplifies this government's lack of compassion. With Bill C-31, this government will definitely further tarnish the image that Canada and Quebec have built as a welcoming country and a safe haven for those who need it most. It is simply shameful.

[Anne Minh-Thu Quach, NDP, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I find it somewhat ironic, even ridiculous, that the member opposite is asking us to agree on a bill, when there was a general consensus among all members of the House on Bill C-11. Everyone made compromises and agreed on the matter. Now, the Conservatives have come back with an amalgamation of bills that are condemned by defenders of rights and freedoms in Canada. Canada's international obligations are being violated in this bill.

Among other things, in this senseless amalgamation of bills, Bill C-4 infringes on the rights of refugees, instead of helping them and dealing with smugglers. There is a lot of inconsistency in all this. I do not see where the government's good faith is with regard to amendments that might be presented. It is also turning a deaf ear to expert advice.

[Djaouida Sellah, NDP, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, although I was not an MP in the previous Parliament, I know that this bill is the logical successor to Bill C-11, which was passed in the 40th parliament. I know enough about this file to say that the bill was negotiated by all parties, including the NDP.

A number of my colleagues, such as the member for Trinity—Spadina, worked very hard to ensure that the bill—which contained some of the measures included in this new bill—would be acceptable to everyone and would bring people together.

What I find fascinating is that none of the negotiated measures are found in this bill, even though they were quite acceptable to the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, the member for Calgary Southeast, who said:

However, many concerns were raised in good faith by parliamentarians and others concerned about Canada's asylum system. We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

Am I dreaming? What has become of the “stronger piece of legislation” that the Minister spoke about? But more importantly, what has become of the good faith?

This bill is the latest manifestation of a new Conservative tradition. Ever since I have been in the House, the Conservatives have gone about things the same way. With every bill, we get the same performance. The government proposes measures and refuses to listen to anyone who does not like them or who suggests changes, as though it were sacrilegious to consider any bill to be less than perfect as of the first reading.

That kind of attitude is deplorable. It is bad for our country and for Canadians because, instead of coming up with the best possible solution for them, we have to settle for things like this.

There are ideological differences between the NDP and the government. That much is clear. The government needs to talk about something other than its “strong mandate”. The fact is that most Canadians did not choose the Conservatives. Not even a majority of voters chose them.

This government has to open its eyes and start working with the opposition parties to improve bills in ways that will benefit Canadians.

Many groups oppose this particular bill. Among those expressing their opposition are groups that the members opposite would call friends of criminals: the Barreau du Québec, the Canadian Bar Association, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. However, these groups speak with considerable authority, and I trust their opinions.

All of these groups raised the following points. First, the minister's discretionary power to designate so-called safe countries is too great. This is not about whether I trust the current minister or not. I would rather leave him in the dark about that. This is about knowing who decides which countries are on the list and about considering how the minister—the current one or his successors—will be subject to economic and diplomatic pressure to that end.

Second, a two-tier refugee system is also a problem. Some will have rights, and others will be assumed to be abusing the system. There will be no consideration for personal history.

What also bothers me about this bill are the potential violations of the international convention. I am sure my colleagues across the floor also received the letter from Human Rights Watch. I urge those who have not yet read it to do so.

The letter raises four points that the organization is really concerned about. First of all, the year-long mandatory detention of asylum seekers violates the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, specifically article 31, which prohibits imposing penalties on refugees simply because they had to enter a country without authorization.

Second, the five-year ban on applying for permanent resident status violates article 34 of the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees. Under that article, states must, as far as possible, facilitate the assimilation and naturalization of refugees. Human Rights Watch is also concerned about the right of separated refugee families to reunite, since obtaining permanent resident status usually takes at least six or seven years.

Third, detaining 16 and 17-year old children violates the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Lastly, Human Rights Watch is concerned about the power vested in the minister to designate which countries are considered safe. In short, once again, all of this will tarnish Canada's reputation on the international stage.

Canada has a reputation as a welcoming country. I have seen this first-hand as an immigrant myself. My experience as a landed immigrant was quite different from what a refugee might experience, but I simply cannot accept that people would systematically be detained because they had to flee an untenable humanitarian situation in their own country. I refuse to let Canada become a country where refugee claimants are treated so poorly that legitimate refugees could be deported before they even have a chance to learn about their rights and the system.

I do not want my country to become a place where refugee claimants will not be considered simply because the government does not want to offend some countries with which it wants to do business. And I certainly do not want to see two classes of refugees.

I strongly oppose this bill because it is harmful to refugees—people who are already vulnerable—instead of offering them a fair, balanced system that does not attack legitimate refugees.

[Jacques Gourde, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Works and Government Services]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to express my support for Bill C-31, the protecting Canada's immigration system act.

If there is one thing that Canadians can be proud of, it is the way we treat foreign nationals who seek our protection. Our asylum system is one of the most generous in the world. Currently, Canada opens its doors to one in 10 of the world's resettled refugees.

Our humanitarian efforts have even been recognized by the United Nations. Since the second world war, Canada has granted asylum to over one million refugees. As a Canadian and a Quebecker, I am proud of our humanitarian tradition. Our government is determined to maintain this tradition that Canadians are so proud of.

Canada welcomes 10% of the world's resettled refugees, more than almost any other country. Our government has also increased the number of resettled refugees, with plans to settle 2,500 more by 2013 for a total of 14,500, which is a 20% increase.

The rationale behind Bill C-31 is simple: by focusing our system's resources on the people who genuinely need our protection, we will be better able to help those people. But we can make our system more generous only if we correct the problems in it.

We got closer to that goal with the passing of the Balanced Refugee Reform Act in June 2010, but the fact is that gaps remain in the system. We need more robust measures that are more like the ones in the bill that was first introduced.

For example, our asylum system is already overwhelmed by a significant backlog of claims. The growing number of bogus claims from European Union democracies is only exacerbating the problem. When we consider that virtually all claims from the European Union in recent years were abandoned, withdrawn or rejected by the Immigration and Refugee Board, an independent body, it is quite apparent that too many of our tax dollars are being spent on people who do not need our protection.

What are we to make of the fact that most claimants from the EU abandon or withdraw their claims, if not that the claimants themselves believe they do not need Canada's protection and therefore filed bogus claims?

By building on the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, Bill C-31 would save hard-working Canadian taxpayers $1.65 billion over five years. I think Canadians would agree that that money could be put to better use than dealing with bogus refugee claimants who abuse our system to enter our country through the back door. Yet that is just what we are doing now. We are using taxpayers' money to help people who should not even be here.

A failed refugee claim costs taxpayers an average of $55,000 because the current system is far too slow. On average, it can take up to 4.5 years from the time an initial claim is made until a failed claimant is removed from Canada. A number of cases have dragged on for more than 10 years. During this time, claimants can receive free health care and social assistance while their claims are pending. Long wait times mean greater costs for Canadian taxpayers.

It also takes too long for people who need our protection to move through the system. Those who truly need our protection now wait approximately two years—20 months—for a decision on their claims, which is unfair to genuine claimants. Our message to genuine claimants who are waiting patiently in line is that we are sorry. We know that they need protection, but they must wait two years before we can tell them whether they will get it. This is just not fair. It is an abuse of our country's generosity.

This situation deprives genuine claimants of their peace of mind and of the opportunity to quickly obtain protection.

In view of these problems, further improvements to our refugee system are obviously needed. Canadians have had enough. They want our government to take action and improve the system. That is exactly what we are doing with Bill C-31.

This bill will not just improve the current system and the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, it will also provide genuine claimants with protection sooner. The success of the new system depends on our ability to expedite the processing of claims, which is essential. The less time claimants spend in Canada waiting for a decision, the less incentive there is to abuse our generous refugee system and to queue-jump the regular immigration process. In addition, by speeding up processing times for refugee claims, we can provide genuine refugees with protection more quickly.

With Bill C-31, for example, claimants from designated countries of origin could have an IRB hearing within 30 to 45 days, as opposed to the 1,000 or more days it currently takes.

Let us be clear: the independent Immigration and Refugee Board will continue to hear every eligible claim, as it does now, regardless of the claimant's country of origin. In addition, every failed claimant will have access to at least one recourse mechanism, such as the refugee appeal division or the Federal Court. These new processing timelines not only mean that people who are in genuine need of Canada's protection will receive it more quickly, they also mean that we can more quickly remove those who do not.

Given the recent spike in the number of unfounded claims from countries that respect human rights and defend democratic values, and that are not usually source countries for refugees, we must absolutely deter the abuse of our refugee system. Quick removals would deter abuse and contribute to reducing the overall cost of our asylum system.

We need to send the right message to both types of refugee claimants: the genuine and the unfounded. Those who truly need our help will get it even faster, but if someone is not in need of protection, that individual will be sent home quickly. These proposed measures will allow us to continue to meet our domestic and international obligations.

These measures will also help to maintain the balance and fairness that are the foundations of our refugee system. Canadians gave our government a clear mandate to preserve the integrity of our immigration system. Bill C-31 delivers on that mandate.

This bill to protect Canada's immigration system will help to provide a quicker and more secure beginning here in Canada for victims of violence and persecution from around the world. At the same time, it will prevent bogus claimants from abusing the generosity of our immigration system and from benefiting from our health and social welfare services, which are paid for by taxpayers.

Canadians, and Quebeckers in particular, take great pride in the generosity of our immigration system, but they have no tolerance for those who abuse our generosity and seek to take unfair advantage of our country.

For all of these reasons, I urge all of my hon. colleagues in the opposition to support this important bill and to help us pass it quickly.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Mr. Speaker, I have great respect for the member, but in his substantive comments, unfortunately there were at least a couple of errors of fact and certainly, in my view, mischaracterizations of the bill in its intent.

One of the areas of fact which I suspect he just repeated and probably a researcher got it off the Internet was the notion that the minister is empowered under Bill C-31 with the ability to arbitrarily strip settled refugees of their permanent residency. There is no such power. This is a complete fiction.

In fact, the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, adopted in 2002 by the government of which he was a member, in section 108 empowers the minister to make an application to the IRB to revoke permanent residency from people for whom protected status has ceased because they obtained such status through fraudulent means or country conditions have changed.

There is no change in the bill in this respect. The minister has no such power. It is a power that belongs to the IRB and is very infrequently used by that quasi-judicial body.

The member talked about 12 months of detention for smuggled claimants. In fact, they would be released following a positive protection decision by the IRB which, under the accelerated timelines of Bill C-31, would be in a matter of weeks or a couple of months.

The member asked why we would penalize claimants from designated safe countries. There is no such penalty. We have an accelerated process which his party agreed to in Bill C-11 in the last Parliament. The only change is that claimants would not have access, if failed at first instance, to the refugee appeal division, which the Liberal government refused to create in the first place.

How is it penalizing people to not give them access to something which does not currently exist?

[Rosane Doré Lefebvre, NDP, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to voice my opposition to a draconian bill that would change the way in which refugees and asylum seekers are treated. I am deeply disappointed in this bill, which revokes most of the compromises that were reached in connection with the former Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, in addition to reintroducing Bill C-4, which targets refugees instead of human smugglers.

Bill C-11, which was passed by a minority government during the previous Parliament, gave rise to what could be considered historic compromises with a view to making truly balanced refugee reforms. But now, at a time when that bill has not yet even come into effect, the government is doing away with everything the members of this House accomplished together and is instead imposing an ideological approach without giving any thought to the lives of the people who will be affected by this change.

By acting in this way, the Conservative government is going back on what it agreed to and demonstrating once again that it does not believe in co-operation and that what it wants more than anything is to put its own ideology ahead of the well-being of the people affected by its decisions. Bill C-31 transforms a balanced measure into a radical, partisan, ideological measure.

I want to remind the House that the Laval immigration detention centre is in my riding, Alfred-Pellan. There are three such centres in Canada: one in Laval, one in Toronto and one in Vancouver. Refugees who cannot prove their identity are incarcerated in this facility, which looks like a prison and is on federal prison property. There, people are handcuffed to be moved and families are kept apart. The centre tells refugees that it will take only a few days to check their identity, but in reality some of them will spend weeks or even months in a place that is run like a medium-security prison.

The average stay at this centre is currently 28 days, according to the Canada Border Services Agency. Detention leaves its mark on asylum seekers' mental health. After being handcuffed when they are moved, having their personal effects confiscated and being separated from their families, detainees leave the centre with serious health problems and depression.

Research proves this. Janet Cleveland, a researcher and psychologist at the CSSS de la Montagne at McGill University, met with nearly 200 asylum seekers during a study on the impact of detention on the mental health of people seeking asylum in Canada. The study was conducted with four other researchers. Over 120 of the asylum seekers had been in detention for three weeks in either Montreal or Toronto when she met them. The others were not being detained.

All the asylum seekers taking part in the study had already endured traumatic experiences when they arrived in Canada, but those who were placed in detention were more likely to suffer from depression, anxiety or post-traumatic shock. When I asked the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism in February why this government was not doing anything to correct this situation, which is intolerable for the officials and the newcomers, he replied that it is true that there is a waiting list for refugee claimants, and that a new system will ensure a processing period of a few weeks. He said new claims would be heard by the IRB within two to three months. Here is what Janet Cleveland said:

As far as the government is concerned, three weeks in a centre is not very long. Yet when we compare these individuals to others who are not being detained, the detained refugees were twice as likely to show serious post-traumatic stress symptoms. We did not expect this result after “only” three weeks of detention.

I would point out that 40% of the immigrants being detained in Laval are there simply while their criminal record are being checked. So, I would ask the minister once again: why are these newcomers being treated like criminals? I am also very worried about the rights of refugees, and of the people who work in these centres, and the way this will be implemented. What worries me even more is the fate of child refugees who are separated from their families and loved ones when they arrive here, and therefore lose their sense of security.

Unlike Bill C-4, Bill C-31 includes an exemption from detention for anyone under the age of 16. That is very good, but when I asked the Minister of Public Safety whether those children would be separated from their families and what would happen to the families, he did not even answer my question. That leads me to believe that, as a result of this bill, children will be separated from their families, which can cause serious psychological problems and trauma for children who are only 16 or younger.

It also makes me think about the measures the minister intends to implement to guarantee that minors will not be detained based on their age when their own identity and age are in the process of being verified. If they do not have documents to prove that they are under the age of 16, what assurance do we have that they will not be detained? For example, will a 14 or 15 year old who looks 16 or older be treated fairly? It is truly quite disturbing.

Since men are detained separately from women and children, what will happen when a single father arrives with his children? Will they be separated immediately upon their arrival?

We must rethink how we treat our brothers and sisters who are seeking asylum. To do so, we must first acknowledge the human nature of their journey, which is fraught with injustice, tragedy and trauma. In my opinion, the amendments proposed by Bill C-31 will result in the criminalization of people who are often victims and have reached the end of their rope.

Is it right to treat them like criminals when they arrive? Is it one of our values to separate and break up families, when their family ties are all they have left?

I recognize the importance of properly identifying refugee claimants. However, I am convinced that it can be done in a more humane way, without compromising the psychological and social well-being of asylum seekers, without breaking up families, without passing this bill which would welcome refugees with detention when they arrive.

I would like to quote a letter from Human Rights Watch dated March 16, 2012, addressed to the members of this House.

HRW believes that the detention provisions of Bill C-31 unduly and inappropriately impose penalties on vulnerable migrants, asylum seekers, and refugees. Instead of identifying and punishing human smugglers, these provisions of the bill would punish irregular migrants, including refugee men, women and children fleeing indiscriminate violence and/or persecution. These people should not be punished on the sole basis of their “irregular” entry.

This letter is signed by Bill Frelick, refugee program director, and Jasmine Herlt, director, Human Rights Watch Canada.

Bill C-31 is bad for refugees and does absolutely nothing to target smugglers. In my opinion, the previous Bill C-11, as amended in the last legislature, takes a more balanced approach, and deserves to be implemented and fairly evaluated. The government constantly talks about the importance of taking action. Here we have a bill, Bill C-11, which is ready to go and I invite the government to move on it.

Canadians and the international community are speaking out against Bill C-31. I am asking the government to reconsider its approach. We have to think of the families that have already lived through so much trauma and are just looking for a place where they can be protected. This bill does not target the right people at all. We absolutely have to rethink this approach. Canada has always welcomed refugees and must continue to do so.

I would also like my colleagues to consider the amendment proposed by the member for Vancouver Kingsway, and I would ask all members of the House to support it.

[Glenn Thibeault, NDP, Sudbury, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I truly am very disappointed that I will not have my full 10 minutes, but I appreciate the fact that you have given me six to seven minutes to talk about how I oppose the bill.

While I say that I oppose the bill, like my colleague from Edmonton—Leduc, I would like to tip my hat to the minister for being here throughout the entire debate. When we are looking at the importance of discussing ideas and trying to come up with the best legislation for the country, it is great that we can have this type of debate.

With that said, now that the hugs are over, I will move forward with my opinions on Bill C-31. New Democrats see this as an omnibus refugee reform bill that combines, in our opinion, the worst parts of the former Bill C-11 in the 40th Parliament and the current Bill C-4.

We see the main purpose is to repeal most of the compromises from the former Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act, that received all-party support and royal assent in June 2010. It reintroduces Bill C-4, the human smuggling bill and introduces the collection of biometrics for temporary residents.

The naming of safe countries and the restriction of refugee rights, concentrating the power to determine safe countries in the hands of the minister, under the former Bill C-11, was to be done by a panel of experts including human rights experts. While we all can agree with the minister, we want to ensure that there would be a panel and human rights experts involved in this process, because no one is perfect. We want to ensure that immigrants could see that we do not leave it in the power of one person.

Refugee claimants from safe countries would face extremely short timelines before hearings, 15 days I believe. They would have no access to the new appeal division and no automatic stay of removal when filing for a judicial review. They would not be allowed to apply for a work permit for 180 days. The bill would also limit access and shorten timelines to file and submit a pre-removal risk assessment application and evidence.

In terms of restricting access to humanitarian and compassionate considerations, I do not think anyone would agree with that. Unfortunately, we are seeing this being pushed through by the government. A refugee claimant could not apply for H and C while the claim was pending for one year after a failed claim, in which time he or she would likely be deported. The bill would make it easier to terminate refugee protection if circumstances changed. This could apply to any legitimate refugee who had not yet become a citizen, potentially affecting tens of thousands of permanent residents. This would contravene international norms on the treatment of refugees and add uncertainty to individuals for years after their arrival. We have talked about how we have always been a progressive country in terms of immigration. I do not think that the bill, even though it may have been well-intended on the government side, does that.

Arbitrary designation of irregular arrivals and their mandatory incarceration is something that we on this side of the House definitely do not agree with. Bill C-31 reintroduces most of the provisions of Bill C-4, which are widely condemned by refugee advocates and likely unconstitutional. It would allow the minister to designate any refugee arrival of a group of two or more as irregular. We can use the examples of the Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady. These irregular arrivals would face mandatory detention for up to one year if they were age 16 and over, or until a positive refugee decision was made, whichever came first.

Irregular arrivals could not apply for permanent residency for five years or sponsor their family for five years. They would have no access to the new refugee appeal division. This designation would create an unfair two-tier refugee system, one for regular refugees and one for irregular arrivals.

Looking at the background of this, the former Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, was supported by all parties in the last Parliament. Several compromises were made to the original bill, largely through the work of the member for Trinity—Spadina and the NDP. It made it acceptable to us and other opposition parties.

These compromises included establishing a panel of experts to determine safe countries, allowing access to appeal for designated nationals and those from designated safe countries, and greater timeliness for the start of the appeal process. Bill C-31, unfortunately, repeals almost all of these compromises.

What would we like to see from an immigration bill, something like C-31 specifically? We do not think the Conservatives have been effective at gaining support for this legislation by promoting fear and talking about the threat of refugees. I do not think anti-immigrant and anti-refugee rhetoric, such as “bogus claimants”, “queue jumpers” and “criminal elements”, does anything to help any of the immigrants coming to Canada. However, I think civil society is solidly against these changes to refugee reform. Experience in other countries, such as Australia for example, show that measures such as these do not have a deterrent effect.

These measures target and punish legitimate refugees. Refugees should not be subject to political manoeuvring, but should be given fair and compassionate treatment. All of those who seek protection should be given equal rights, with equal rights to appeal. No country is free from persecution. This is especially true of women and gays and lesbians fleeing violence and persecution.

To summarize, refugees have the right to a fair hearing. The right to appeal is critical for vulnerable claimants at the mercy of an inconsistent and often arbitrary Immigration and Refugee Board. We do not believe that the bill will accomplish that.

I am sure I will have a few minutes on another day to continue, but with that I do wish everyone a very Happy St. Patrick's Day tomorrow and a great constituency week.

[James Rajotte, Conservative, Edmonton—Leduc, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate this opportunity to join the debate on Bill C-31, protecting Canada's immigration system act. I have enjoyed the debate and I will concur with my colleague opposite with respect to the minister and the fact that he has been present during this debate. It is an outstanding example for all parliamentarians.

We as Canadians are rightfully proud about our long-standing humanitarian tradition and about the fact that we are one of the top countries in the world to offer protection to those who are in need of asylum. There is no country in the G20 that welcomes more refugees per capita than Canada. We resettle one in ten refugees.

Canada is continuing its tradition as a leader in international refugee protection. Our government has increased the number of refugees we will be resettling by 2,500 per year.

Canadians are proud of our welcoming and fair nature. Nonetheless, few Canadians would disagree that our refugee system is in need of reform, as we see time and time again refugee claimants simply waiting too long for a decision on their claim. We also realize the need to stop those who are abusive of our generous immigration system, and we are therefore taking action to that end.

Canada's current asylum system is bogged down by bogus refugee claimants from countries that are democratic and safe. These claimants do not wait in line like everyone else. In fact, they make an attempt to jump the queue. This leaves in limbo those who genuinely are in need of Canada's protection but also allows those who really do not need our protection to unfortunately abuse our system.

Many genuine refugees have fled their homes because of unimaginable hardship and in many cases have been forced to live in refugee camps for many years. When they arrive in Canada, they essentially start all over again. These genuine refugee claimants unfortunately are waiting years for determination on their claim. They are waiting because of an increasing number of refugee claims from safe and democratic countries. We should just look at the numbers for examples.

The total number of refugee claims from the European Union in 2011 was 5,800, a 14% increase from 2010. That is more than Africa and Asia.

Virtually all claims from the EU are abandoned, withdrawn or rejected. These are bogus refugees that are not in need of Canada's protection. They withdraw their own claims after they receive money unfortunately from our taxpayer funded welfare system and after they get taxpayer funded medical care. These claimants from the European Union cost Canadian taxpayers $170 million per year. That is simply not fair to Canadian taxpayers and it is not fair to genuine refugees who are waiting in line for Canada's protection.

Last year processing times for a decision on a claim before the independent Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada could take more than 20 months. It can take an average of four and a half years from the time a claim is made until a failed refugee claimant has exhausted all legal avenues and is removed from Canada. In some instances, cases have dragged on for more than a decade. Long delays encourage individuals who are not in need of our protection to use the refugee system as a way to remain in Canada. During that time, taxpaying Canadians pay for their health care and other generous social benefits.

Our government is closing the loopholes in our asylum system. We are listening to Canadians and acting in the best interests of Canadian taxpayers. No longer will these bogus refugee claimants be able to abuse our generous asylum system.

Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which was previously passed, provided for faster processing timelines to quickly decide claims. It introduced a designated country of origin policy to further expedite the processing of claims from those countries.

As we proceeded with the implementation of that bill, it became clear that further reforms were needed. The rising number of refugee claims coming from countries that are not normally considered as refugee producing has warranted additional measures. This is why we have introduced a bill in addition to the Balanced Refugee Reform Act.

We need to send a clear and unmistakable message to those who seek to abuse Canada's generous asylum system that if they are not in need of protection, they will be sent home quickly. At the same time, we need measures to ensure that those who truly need our help get it in a timely manner.

When the recent wave of bogus refugee asylum claims came flooding in from the democratic and human rights respecting European Union, it was made clear that further reforms to Canada's asylum system were urgently needed. We are a responsible government that is not afraid to admit that our previous legislation was not strong enough in this area.

We have a mandate from the people of Canada to protect our immigration system. We listened and we are acting on that mandate.

The protecting Canada's immigration system act would make our refugee system faster and fairer. In this time of economic uncertainty, increased numbers of unfounded refugee claims create a financial burden on Canadian taxpayers.

Under the proposed system, claimants from designated countries of origin would get a hearing quickly, within 30 to 45 days, depending on whether they initially made their claim at an inland office or a port of entry. All other claimants would receive their hearings within 60 days. Let me be very clear about this. Under these new measures, all eligible refugee claimants would continue to be entitled to a fair hearing before an independent decision maker.

At this point I would like to quote what two very distinguished Canadian columnists have to say about our proposals and improvements.

John Ibbitson of the Globe and Mail stated:

I think we need a system first of all that doesn’t cost too much....if you spend four years processing a bogus refugee claim, that’s the taxpayer who pays for it and that person may also be on welfare and other forms of social assistance during that time. So I agree. And I think there is broad public support for the idea that we need to process refugee claimants fairly and swiftly.

Another distinguished columnist, John Ivison of the National Post, stated:

I was talking to somebody today who was saying within four days of a claimant landing in Toronto, they can be claiming welfare. Now that's an obvious magnet for refugees all over the world. We have the most generous refugee system in the world. We have an acceptance rate of something like 50 per cent. Nowhere else in the world comes close to that.

Well, how many people do you need to consult to figure out that Hungary should not be our leading sources of refugees? What had happened was that the ten, the top ten countries that we receive refugees from did not figure in the UN’s top ten list of refugees.

In closing, let me reiterate that the proposed protecting Canada's immigration system act builds on reforms passed in June 2010 as part of the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. These new measures further accelerate the processing of refugee claims for nationals from designated countries which are those that generally do not produce refugees.

In addition, the proposals reduce the options available to failed claimants to delay their removal from Canada. As a result, genuine refugees would receive Canada's protection much more quickly. Even after these changes, Canada's refugee determination system would still proudly remain one of the most generous in the world.

I urge all hon. members of the House to join me in supporting the bill in order to improve program integrity and deter abuse of our refugee system.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his constructive comments, for what he did as the former minister of immigration, and for his knowledge of this problem.

He raised the issue of Hungary and the designation of certain countries in order to accelerate the processing of claims. However, once Bill C-31 is passed, no refugee claimant from Hungary or the European Union, which are designated countries, will have access to a hearing before a decision-maker at the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. That means that all claimants from all countries, regardless of the manner in which they entered Canada, including migrants who are smuggled into the country, will have access to the same system that currently exists, that is, a hearing before a decision-maker based on the merit of their cases.

The only difference is that the processing will be slightly quicker, which was agreed to by the opposition in the last Parliament in the form of Bill C-11. Moreover, claimants will not have access to the Refugee Appeal Division that his government and he, as minister, did not create.

Why is he concerned about the fact that we are not diminishing the rights of claimants from designated safe countries?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Mr. Speaker, unfortunately, there were all kinds of factual errors in my colleague's speech. For instance, he criticized the system for being two-tiered. Indeed, we created a two-tiered system in Bill C-11 in the previous Parliament, and the NDP supported that bill. It simply means an expedited system for refugee claimants from a list of designated safe countries, which is a completely legitimate and normal system according to the UN High Commissioner. A similar refugee system is used by nearly all other countries in the democratic world.

His biggest mistake, however, was when he said that the government could designate a country as safe and then take away a refugee's permanent residency 30 years after he or she obtained it. There are no such provisions in Bill C-31. Under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Immigration and Refugee Board has always had the power to terminate someone's refugee protection and withdraw their permanent residency, for instance, when someone obtained it fraudulently.

Can the member indicate what clause in Bill C-31 gives the minister or the government new powers to withdraw refugees' permanent residency? There is no such clause.

[Sylvain Chicoine, NDP, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will get right to the point. Bill C-31 is a blot on Canada's reputation. This bill will tarnish our international image as a host country. It will be a major step backward with respect to protecting refugees in Canada. It puts tremendous power in the hands of the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism and fails to revamp Canada's refugee determination system. The purpose of this bill is not, as stated, to fight human smuggling or to help asylum seekers by expediting the process. Its true purpose is something else entirely. All it will do is punish refugees.

Bill C-31 is a patchwork of bits and pieces of old bills, including Bill C-4 on human trafficking, Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, and biometrics.

One of the bills introduced during this Parliament was Bill C-4. That bill received such strong opposition from lawyers and refugee rights organizations that the government dropped it. This bill would allow the minister to designate the arrival of refugees as an irregular arrival. The bill uses the phrase “a group of persons” without really specifying how many persons constitute a group. We presume that two people could indeed constitute a group. These designation criteria are far too vague and disproportionate and leave too much room for legal interpretation. A family fleeing a war-torn country would be a group of persons.

The most despicable proposal in this bill is the one whereby any person designated a “foreign national” will be detained for a maximum period of one year, without review and without any chance of appeal.

Immigration detention centres are already overcrowded. Accordingly, these designated persons will likely be transferred to provincial prisons to live with criminals. Under this bill, a person could be detained for 12 months without review.

According to the bill, a person in detention who receives permanent resident status will not be released since they are not entitled to a review of their case for a period of one year.

The government is not giving any thought to the distress felt by these people who have fled a country in the hope of having a better life. This government is not considering the desolation of these people who are fleeing persecution in their country and who now are being mixed in with the criminal population for a year without review of their case, as I was saying.

These measures go completely against the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and international law. The Supreme Court ruled in the Charkaoui case that detention under a security certificate is unconstitutional. That means that every person in Canada has the right to appear before a judge within 48 business hours. The Conservative government has no qualms about introducing a bill that is likely unconstitutional.

Under the Supreme Court ruling, detention has to be subject to a timely and regular review to ensure that it continues to be legal. All asylum seekers not arriving in groups, therefore arriving alone, are entitled to this review. Families would be exempt from this review because they constitute a group of two or more people.

Not only can a group be detained for a year, in addition, no exception is made for the individuals in the group, regardless of gender, age or health status. These inhumane provisions are a direct violation of the 1951 Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. Indeed, this United Nations convention clearly indicates that no host country shall impose sanctions against refugees by reason of their illegal entry if they present themselves without delay to the authorities and give good reason for their illegal entry.

Canada is, in fact, a signatory to this convention.

The measures proposed in the bill are an attempt to discourage refugees from seeking protection in Canada. Not only are these people being detained without the right to appeal their case, but the implacable attitude of this government will end up increasing the number of removals. That goes entirely against the humanitarian values Canada espouses and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Moreover, this bill stipulates that refugees shall be banned from making an application for permanent residence for a five-year period after obtaining refugee status.

Once again, this bill violates the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees by prohibiting any person who has obtained refugee status from traveling outside Canada. The refugee will, therefore, have no travel document. That also violates the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Furthermore, refugee claimants will not be able to sponsor their families for a period of five years. That means, for example, that a 15-year-old teenager who enters the country illegally will not be able to sponsor his parents for five years. Bearing in mind these constraints alone and the average time it takes to process claims for refugee protection and applications for permanent residence, refugees will be separated from their families for seven years. These measures are discouraging for all refugee claimants.

The minister also reserves the right to designate a country as safe for foreign nationals without even benefiting from the expertise of a committee on human rights. This measure will result in the implementation of stricter deadlines to submit a claim for refugee protection. This will make it difficult to properly prepare an application, which may lead to a refusal.

Moreover, the refugee claimants from the list of countries deemed safe by the minister who have been forced to leave the country will no longer be entitled to file an appeal before the Immigration and Refugee Board. If they are determined to appeal, their only recourse is to seek a judicial review before the Federal Court. Despite this provision, there is a strong likelihood that the claimant will be deported to his country of origin before the court has had time to make a decision. Furthermore, this bill prevents the Refugee Protection Division from reopening files. This clause goes against the principles of natural justice. This bill needlessly takes away a jurisdiction that has always existed.

Another clause is being added to the long list of barriers to claims for asylum. Once again, this clause gives another discretionary power to the minister that allows him to detain any individual who is suspected of a crime. There is no guideline for the principle of suspicion. However, it does not stop there, because the bill specifies that it is possible to turn down any claim if a person has committed an offence, even if it is a trivial offence. Let us take the example of a person who, in his own country, refused to obey an order from the dictatorial government and dared to express his opinion publicly, and finds himself with a criminal record because of it. Canada would refuse his claim because of this offence, without even considering the cases of persecution for which that government is responsible.

This Conservative government is going even further in its indifference to the suffering of thousands of people who are fleeing persecution. In granting permanent resident status to refugees, Canada is offering them safety to settle in our country and quietly begin their lives over again. However, the Conservatives, with their misguided thinking, want to grant permanent resident status on a conditional basis. This bill would allow an application for permanent resident status to be suspended when the country of origin is on the list of countries considered safe and stable, countries that are put on the list by virtue of the minister's discretionary power.

That is not all. This clause is retroactive, which means that thousands of permanent residents will have to leave their new country and new life in Canada. Take the example of someone who left his country because of political persecution 30 years ago. When he arrived in Canada, he asked for asylum and we granted him permanent resident status. He began a family here, but 30 years later the government tells him that his country is safe and he can go back.

Bill C-31 is underhanded; it goes even further. The Conservatives also want to demand biometric data from applicants for a visitor visa, a student visa or a working visa. Biometrics has a reputation as a technology that gives considerable power to states for keeping an eye on people. Bill C-31 put forward by the Conservatives is a huge reversal in immigration policy and is aimed solely at refugees and asylum seekers, to their detriment. The Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism is giving himself the right to make criminals of certain refugees and throw them in jail, without review of their files, for a period of one year.

The Conservative government is now interfering with the right of every person to defend himself. I believe that this bill is discriminatory and that it sets up a two-tier system for refugee protection.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Mr. Speaker, obviously since Bill C-11 was passed, things have changed and we have to update our refugee and immigration system.

I have a personal story to tell with respect to refugees from when I was a high school student in Winnipeg. I am of Czech extraction. When I was a high school student my family was part of the Czechoslovakian community in Winnipeg. I remember very well the Prague Spring of 1968 and the Warsaw Pact invasion of my father's country. It was a devastating experience for all of us when we realized what could happen in the world. As a teenager, I witnessed refugees coming to Winnipeg, some of whom even stayed in our home. I take the refugee issue seriously and personally.

The abuses that criminals and fraudsters will undertake to take advantage of Canadians' historical generosity simply must be dealt with. We are doing that with this bill.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with some interest to the comments. One of the unfortunate facets of the Conservatives' approach is they put so many different provisions that have different meanings and applications into one bill and then use that as an opportunity to say, “But you voted against it”.

There are certain aspects of this bill that clearly we agree with. We agree with the notion that the refugee system is broken, which is why we passed Bill C-11. Bill C-11 does an enormous amount to streamline the refugee system in this country and to make it less likely that people could abuse the system.

However, the amendments being proposed to Bill C-11, and the addition of Bill C-4, make it impossible for this side of the House to agree to create a system where we would be making people victims. Even if people are refugees, we do not believe that the government, or any government, should make them victims. That is what this bill would do.

I would ask for the comments of the member opposite.

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, one of the major problems with the bill is it would concentrate more power in the hands of the minister, who clearly does not know what is going on within his ministry, by allowing him to name safe countries and restrict refugees from those countries. Under the former Bill C-11 that was passed in the previous Parliament, which from what I understand enjoyed approval by all parties and was balanced, there was a panel of experts, including human rights experts, that was to designate these countries. This is no longer case.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in light of the fact that we are talking about our clothing colour, I am wearing some green but also some black today in honour of my heritage but also to remind people that it is a gloomy day here in the House.

The bill undoes a lot of good work that took place in the last Parliament and, although I asked my friend opposite what exactly the differences were, all he could say was that there were gaps. What the government is now doing is creating gaps, where those gaps had been filled, where there was agreement by the parties to fix the problems with the legislation in such a way that all circumstances were taken care of. We have now created a whole bunch of gaps in this legislation that are glaring by their example, as was evidenced a few moments ago.

Those in some countries who may be declared safe but who happen to belong to the gay and lesbian community may in fact be refugees. However, under this new bill, they would not have the opportunity to be exempted from the rather horrendous provision of having to have a hearing within 15 days and, if they do not win, they are out.

Government members argued at some length in earlier speeches that a significant percentage of supposed refugee claimants abandoned their claim in the course of that period of time. We, on this side of the House, agree that we do not want fake claims. We do not want to encourage a system where people are coming to this country merely to abuse our system. Bill C-11, in the previous Parliament, would have fixed the problem of the fake claimants. It would have fixed the problem to everyone's satisfaction and to the minister's satisfaction. The minister praised the bill. What has changed between Bill C-11 of the last Parliament and now in terms of Canada's refugee system? Absolutely nothing. Nothing has changed since then to warrant such new and draconian measures being placed into this legislation.

The new law would have taken effect in June of this year. We could have had a law that had been through the process and was ready to roll, that fixed all of the problems, which are being talked about again in the House, of the abuse of Canada's refugee system. Those things would have been fixed and we are throwing it away. We are wasting an awful lot of time, energy and resources, but for what purpose?

One of the things that is glaring in the bill that maybe is the purpose is the absolute power it would give the minister. The minister would have the absolute power, and despite the comments from the other side that he would consult, ultimately it falls within the power of one human being to determine for most of the planet whether people are safe from persecution or not.

Lord Acton of Britain stated that, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men”. Those words were spoken over 100 years ago in the British system to describe what happens when someone is given too much power. It becomes a corrupting influence. I have the utmost of regard for the current Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism. I think he will probably do a good job, but who knows who will come next?

We in Toronto have discovered just what happens when power is given to the person in charge. During David Miller's term as mayor, there was a big push on the part of the mayor to give the mayor more power to select an executive committee and to run things in a much more autocratic way. We can see what happened. We ended up with a mayor who is now abusing that power, who is running amok and who now faces the possibility of being stripped of his office as a result of the power that he has used.

That is what comes from putting too much power into the hands of one individual, and that is part of what the bill would do. It would create a system that would put everything into the hands of one individual, and we do not know who that individual will be next.

We also have situations where exemptions, exceptions that were provided for in Bill C-11, have been eliminated. For example, an individual in my riding is a coroner working for the police in what will probably be designated as a safe country. The person came to Canada as a refugee because the police told him that they could no longer protect him because he had given too much evidence against the criminal gangs that happen to exist in that country. Although the country is generally safe, that individual had to leave a beautiful home, a successful practice and quite a well-to-do lifestyle in that country because his life was in danger. The person has now gone through several stages of applying to be a refugee, which is very difficult to establish for an individual coming from such circumstances.

The bill would probably send that person back to that country to probably be killed because that country is designated as safe country, and that is wrong. The minister needs the ability to find exemptions. Individuals need to access to the legal system and access to justice, but that is being denied them by this 15 day maximum time period.

I also want to talk a bit about the old Bill C-4, which is now rolled into this bill, the Sun Sea and Ocean Lady part of the bill that suggests that persons who the minister, again leaving the power in the hands of one individual, a different minister this time, declares as irregular arrivals would make victims of those individuals.

We have heard over and over again about how the government is on the side of the victim. It is not here t in this bill. Those individuals who were innocent until they arrived in Canada are now the victims and are now to be punished by being incarcerated the day they set foot in Canada as soon as the minister declares that arrival to be an irregular arrive, which clearly would have been the case with the Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady, and probably many other arrivals we do not even know about that the minister is keeping tabs on.

That is wrong. It is wrong to create victims where victims do not exist. We all agree that persons who engage in human smuggling ought to be punished, ought to be rooted out and ought to be held to account. However, not the individuals who are seeking refuge in this country and found that the only way they could get here was through this kind of mechanism. That is how desperate people are in these countries. They accept that they need to get here through human smuggling because they have no other way to get here. We have now made victims of those individuals and that is not in keeping with what the government keeps telling us that it is all about.

We are, in fact, on the side of the victims. We are, in fact, on the side of the individuals who have been persecuted in their own country, escape by whatever means and who should not be victimized. They should not be made into criminals merely because of the means of their arrival in Canada.

The final little piece of the bill is making e victims of children. In the previous bill, Bill C-4, the government forgot that persons under 16 probably should not be slapped in jail. What has it done? Instead of saying that the parents of children under 16 will not be put in jail, the government has now said that the parents will be put in jail but the children will not. Where will that leave the children? What kind of message does that send?

I will wrap up by saying that we should not be making further victims of the children who come to this country as refugees but that, apparently, is what the bill would do.

[Joe Daniel, Conservative, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, clearly there are gaps in what was in Bill C-11. Those gaps are being completed by this bill. That would actually prevent refugee claims from countries where there are no persecutions or prosecutions taking place.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things that has come to my attention is that most of the strengthening of Canada's immigration system will happen anyway without this bill. In June of this year there will be implementation of the former Bill C-11, which in fact does the things the government keeps talking about need to be done. They are already going to be done.

What is so urgent and necessary that we undo what was agreed to before and now present something completely different, much more restrictive and not agreed to by the other parties in the House? Can the member outline what significant differences there are that are so egregious, that so many false refugee claims would not be captured by the existing Bill C-11?

[Francine Raynault, NDP, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as you might suspect, the NDP is strongly opposed to this bill, which punishes refugees instead of offering them a rapid and equitable system.

I have a question. This bill concentrates more powers in the hands of the minister by allowing him to designate safe countries and to restrict the number of refugees from these countries.

Under the old bill C-11, this decision was made by a group of experts, including experts in human rights. Why is this change being made?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Mr. Speaker, the member portrayed a fundamental misunderstanding of the legislation when he said that the bill concentrates, in the hands of the minister, the power to decide who may or may not make asylum claims in Canada.

That is patently and completely incorrect. The bill would do no such thing. All claimants from all countries, whether designated by the minister or not, whether they have arrived in a designated smuggling operation or not, would have the same access to an oral hearing at the IRB on the merits of their claim. No one would be denied access at the discretion of the minister or on the basis of their country of origin.

Safe country claimants and claimants determined to be manifestly unfounded would have an accelerated process, which the Liberals and the NDP already agreed to in the last Parliament in Bill C-11. What Bill C-31 changes is that it removes access to the refugee appeal division for safe country claimants. However, under the Liberals, for 13 years they refused to give any failed asylum claimants access to a refugee appeal division.

Why is the member opposed to a bill that gives the vast majority of failed claimants access to a fact-based appeal when his government, in which he was a minister, refused to give any failed refugee claimants access to a fact-based appeal?

[Anne-Marie Day, NDP, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in my remarks, I said that amendments had been proposed to the previous government's Bill C-11 and that we were starting from scratch in this current Parliament. We could have taken the amendments previously approved by the three parties and continued with the work at hand.

The bill refers to sending refugees to a safer country. What country is safer than Canada? Why do we not keep out immigrants and refugees? And why would we send them to a so-called safer country? What safer country is there than Canada?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the member has just said that the bill gives the minister the power to withdraw permanent resident status from refugees. Where did the member find this information, in which clause of the bill? I wrote this bill. I have the bill right in front of me. There is no clause in this bill that gives the minister the power to withdraw permanent resident status. What clause is she talking about? It does not exist.

In addition, she is talking about a two-tier system. I would like to remind the member that, during the last Parliament, Bill C-11, supported by the NDP, aimed at creating a two-tier system, that is, an accelerated process for asylum seekers from designated safe countries.

Why is she against a two-tier system now, when her party was in favour of such a system in the last Parliament?

[Anne-Marie Day, NDP, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my NDP colleagues for expressing their points of view on immigration and the shortcomings of Bill C-31 so brilliantly.

I agree with my colleagues and I have reservations about this bill, which should be reviewed and amended. There is no doubt that in a world as globalized and complex as the one we live in, the Canadian government must always make it a priority to protect Canadians and keep them safe. However, the approach proposed by the Conservatives clashes with Canadian values and fails to achieve the primary goal, which is to protect our borders while remaining a welcoming and attractive country for immigrants.

I would like my colleagues on the other side to justify the glaring deficiencies in this bill to the House. First of all, one of the clauses in the bill concentrates too much power in the hands of the immigration minister by allowing him to decide which countries will be designated as safe countries of origin, which will reduce the number of refugees coming from these countries. An elected official, by himself, cannot replace an impartial expert panel. In addition to handing over too much power to the minister, this type of procedure leaves the door wide open to partisanship that is directly associated with our country's foreign policy objectives.

The NDP believes that immigration and support for refugees cannot be manipulated in this way merely to serve the country's economic interests. A sound immigration policy should promote Canada's economic development, but it cannot ostracize refugees who are seeking asylum in Canada without violating our international obligations. How can this government claim that only the minister has the expertise and holds the truth in immigration law in Canada?

Another very important point concerns the status of thousands of permanent residents. The bill would make it easier to cancel the claim for refugee protection if the circumstances were to change in the refugee's country of origin, even if he or she had become a permanent resident of Canada.

What this really means is that the new Conservative bill might result in thousands of refugees with permanent resident status having that status withdrawn and being expelled from Canada. We know that under the current legislation Canada's protection may already be withdrawn if, for instance, calm has been restored in the refugees’ country of origin and they can live there in safety, or if they obtain citizenship in another safe country. However, once they had obtained permanent resident status, these nationals were guaranteed the right of residence and could keep their status unless they committed a serious crime or fraud in order to obtain permanent resident status.

Why should we toughen up the existing legislation if it is only to frighten immigrants who are trying to rebuild their lives in Canada and who will have this provision hanging over them like the sword of Damocles?

This type of provision will undoubtedly prove to be counterproductive because future immigrants, most of whom are skilled and interested in contributing to Canada's economic prosperity, will instead choose other countries where their lives will be less constrained and more stable in the long term. Furthermore, the fact that this government is not required to strictly apply this law makes too much room for vague and ill-defined powers and uncertainty as to how the law will be applied.

In this regard, I will quote Le Devoir:

An average of 25,000 refugees a year have obtained permanent resident status over the past five years. The number last year was 24,700. On average it takes between 18 and 22 months. They must then wait three years before applying for citizenship, which takes an average of 19 months. It takes a minimum of five to six years to become a citizen, if the process goes quickly. Under the new legislation, the thousands of refugees admitted every year are at risk, not to mention those who simply have not yet applied.

In addition to this major concern, I would like the government to explain why its new bill contains a clause that prohibits entry of asylum seekers who were incarcerated in their country for more than 10 years, and why no discretion is given to a tribunal in the case of political refugees. We all know that thousands of refugees flee their country of origin because they run the risk of having to serve, or they have served, prison sentences because of their religion, ethnicity, political convictions or sexual orientation.

This type of unfair legislation quite simply endorses the discriminatory position that certain countries impose on their citizens rather than helping them to start their lives over in a supposedly fairer and more democratic country such as ours. I am not saying we should be bringing criminals to Canada, but we should be helping refugees who have been unfairly accused in their home countries.

Bill C-31 permits the arbitrary designation of irregular arrivals and their mandatory detention, which is completely unconstitutional. Need we remind this government that the arrival of refugees by irregular means, such as by boat, is legitimate and that we must respect the international treaties regarding refugee rights that we have signed? Canada has recognized these humanitarian rights in accordance with the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, called the Geneva convention.

An individual's right to life, liberty and security of the person is also spelled out in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It is therefore mandatory in Canada to protect refugees and not expose them to persecution. Those persons who arrive in Canada by their own means can claim refugee protection at any Canadian border or at an immigration office within Canada.

However, according to the new proposed legislation, irregular arrivals will be subject to maximum mandatory imprisonment of one year if they are 16 or older. They will not be able to apply for permanent residence or sponsor a family member for five years and will not have access to the new Refugee Appeal Division. Now, that is a two-tier system. It is totally illegitimate and unfair to immigrants and flies completely in the face of Canadian values.

In its press release announcing the new bill, the Conservative government accuses “bogus refugee claimants” from what it considers to be safe countries of slowing down Canada's immigration process and penalizing the “good” immigrants. The government even contends, “These bogus claims cost Canadian taxpayers upwards of $170 million per year. That's why the government...introduced the Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act.”

The government is therefore proposing savings of $170 million to protect an immigration system that will never be 100% secure. What, then, is the total cost of imprisonment? We do not know. Can the government provide an estimate as to the cost of this legislation?

I would like to remind Canadians and my colleagues in the House that Bill C-11 from the previous Parliament had to do with balanced reforms concerning refugees. I would also remind the House that that bill was the subject of many compromises and was supported by all parties. By bringing a bill like Bill C-31 back to the table, this government is doing three things that are totally unacceptable.

First of all, it is preventing anyone from seeing the effectiveness and the value of legislation that has already been passed, since Bill C-11 is being killed before it even came into force. Second, it is arrogantly rebuffing all the work that was done on Bill C-11 by introducing a new bill that is practically identical, but ignores all the amendments adopted in the previous Parliament. Third, it is disgracefully wasting taxpayers' money by forcing us members to redo work that was already done respectfully and conscientiously.

Some 14% of the people of my riding are immigrants. Among them are thousands of permanent residents who work hard and contribute to the social and economic development of Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles and the greater Quebec City region. Thousands of them are also worried about their status and want answers.

The NDP believes that we must fulfill our duty to refugees while maintaining an effective, impartial immigration system. Bill C-31 puts refugees in a class with criminals. The bill is ineffective and leaves too much room for the political manoeuvring that characterizes the party across the floor. The government needs to redo its homework.

Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act

[Anne Minh-Thu Quach, NDP, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Mr. Speaker, with all due respect to the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, maybe he takes us for fools, but his claim that Bill C-31 does not make any major changes to the measures in Bill C-11 is completely false.

For a moment or two, he should put himself in the position of a refugee, a person who is trying to escape his country, perhaps because he faces persecution, and who arrives here by boat, on foot or in a group.

This bill places several discretionary powers in the hands of the minister. It gives the minister three main discretionary powers. The first is the power to designate safe countries of origin. In many situations, even in developed countries, people can be persecuted and subjected to sexual violence. The previous speaker talked about sexual persecution of gay people.

The minister can also designate as an irregular arrival the arrival of a group of persons, which is completely arbitrary, and can impose conditions on a designated asylum claim. In addition, the minister can incarcerate individuals whose eligibility is unknown because they do not have any documentation. People who flee serious situations because they fear for their lives might not think to bring the proper documentation.

[Anne Minh-Thu Quach, NDP, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative Minister of Immigration's Bill C-31 looks a lot more like a monopoly on the power to make decisions than a way to improve refugees' quality of life.

Once again, the Conservatives' thirst for power, their lack of rigour and their refusal to listen are taking a toll on justice, respect and equality. This bill is the latest in a long line of bills that most stakeholders consider irresponsible, even senseless. Opponents include the Canadian Council for Refugees, Amnesty International Canada, and the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, to name but a few.

All of these opponents have indicated that this bill will make the system vulnerable to political considerations rather than ensure fair, independent and balanced decisions about who can be considered a refugee.

Bill C-31 makes us fear the worst for refugees who have become permanent residents. It is also discriminatory and, as the Canadian Council for Refugees pointed out, it creates a two-tier refugee protection system. According to the council, strict, tight deadlines will put victims of sexual trauma and members of the LGBT community at a major disadvantage. These people often need time to open up and tell their story. Two weeks is not enough. But for the Conservative government, ignoring the needs of the most vulnerable is nothing new.

To think that barely 18 months ago, the Conservative minister congratulated his opposition colleagues on reaching an agreement on some amendments that would make the refugee system, and I quote, “faster and fairer”.

Now that the Conservatives have a majority, we can expect that measures that the Centre for Refugee Studies calls radical and draconian will be added to these fair amendments. While last year the minister agreed to a sensible compromise in a minority situation, he can now pass whatever legislation he pleases, no matter how undemocratic it is. This is serious and appalling.

No longer will it be left up to a panel of experts—as it should—to come up with a list of “safe countries”, from which the federal government does not think refugees usually come. In addition, no longer will it be possible for residents of those designated countries of origin to appeal their cases if their claims are rejected. This is a human rights violation. Unsuccessful claimants will have to wait one year before applying again on humanitarian grounds, during which time they can be sent back to their country, a country they tried to flee.

It is especially unfortunate that the government continues using terms like “bogus claimants”, terms that are extremely harmful.

While not every individual who files a refugee claim necessarily needs extreme protection, that does not make these refugee claimants “potential abusers”. These people may have very good reasons for leaving their country.

Refugees are some of the most vulnerable members of society and are, therefore, easy targets for attack as non-citizens in a foreign country. Denigrating labels, especially those given by the government, have a serious negative impact on the public's perception of refugees and non-citizens in general.

Canada is a model for the rest of the world. It is known for welcoming people who are fleeing persecution. This important asset is going to be lost because of a new proposal by this government that emphasizes speed and categorization, at the expense of fairness, justice and protecting individuals.

In our opinion, the government is pushing its mandate far too far. In many ways, Bill C-31 represents the unprecedented dismantling of Canada's refugee system. If we just take the example of Australia, which had to go back to a system similar to our current system, it is clear that the approach outlined in Bill C-31 does not work. The Conservatives would save Canadians a lot of time and money if they stopped navel gazing and starting using facts, expert studies, statistics and concrete examples to support their bills.

On average, 25,000 refugees have obtained permanent resident status every year of the past five years. Last year, the number was 24,700. After a waiting period of three years, it takes an average of 18 to 22 months before the person can apply for citizenship, which takes an average of 19 months.

It takes at least five to six years for a person to become a citizen, if the process goes quickly. This bill threatens the thousands of refugees admitted every year, not to mention those who have not yet applied.

The minister wants to pass this vague bill in September, when the former Bill C-11 has not even come into force. Why be in such a rush to pass, at all costs, a bungled bill that has such serious consequences for people's lives? What is more, clause 19 literally undermines Canada's commitment to refugees, makes a mockery of our commitment to the United Nations to grant permanent residence to refugees, and puts tens of thousands of refugees who have already been granted permanent resident status in Canada at risk of deportation.

Out of respect for Canada's commitment to the United Nations, refugees who have settled here permanently have and should always have the right to rebuild their lives, to work and to raise their families knowing that Canada is and will remain their permanent home.

This is one of the most positive characteristics of our country. Canada's promotion of rapid and permanent resettlement is an enormous advantage, just as much for all Canadians as for all refugees. Instead of living in uncertainty, refugees become active and productive members of our society. The feeling of security that accompanies permanent residence cannot be overestimated and should be a formality.

Canada's commitments to the UN are nevertheless clear: refugees who receive permanent resident status are entitled to rebuild their lives in the host country, to work and to have a family. They will not succeed in integrating into Canadian society if they are constantly under the threat of being sent back to the country they fled.

Canada is a land of refuge and I am grateful, for if it had not been, I would not be here today. My parents came here in the wave of boat people after the Vietnam War, which enabled a number of new Canadians to take refuge here. In certain cases, this change might expose them to potentially violent reprisals if they go back to their country of origin.

Determining refugee status is complex and difficult. It is not easy to decide whether a person needs protection or not. On the other hand, for refugees, the need for protection at all times is simple, but critical. For Canadians, the question is simple: are we going to make sure that refugees are not going back to persecution? It seems to me that the answer should be simple.

In summary, what the Conservative government wants is the discretionary and automatic power to remove at any time a person who was granted refugee status in Canada and who then received permanent resident status. This is what I vehemently oppose, on behalf of all refugees, like my parents and my brothers, who flee their country, risking their lives, without identification and who hope, no matter what happens to them, to find a safe haven and live with dignity in a country to which they will contribute on a social, cultural or economic level. These people want to go on living with their heads held high, and they have human rights that must be respected.

Bill C-31 does not target criminals or human traffickers or those who would take advantage of refugees. We worked on the old bill C-11; there are many points that need another look. I am therefore asking the Conservative government to go back to the drawing board with this bill.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak very strongly in opposition to Bill C-31, which has been given another one of those new-speak titles, protecting Canada's immigration system act.

It is really a reincarnation of the previous Bill C-4, which I spoke against on second reading, so I will repeat some of those same arguments. Essentially this new bill has most of those same flaws as the previous bill.

I am opposed to the bill based, first, on my personal experience. In the 1980s, I became involved in refugee work, largely around the political crisis in Central America. I became the co-founder of the Victoria Immigrant and Refugee Centre and I opened my own home to refugees who fled for their lives, having had other members of their families killed or tortured as a result of violence in Central America. I also worked as an international human rights monitor in East Timor, Ambon in Indonesia and in Afghanistan. Therefore, I have seen the situations which create the international refugees who seek safety for themselves and their families in Canada.

I am also opposed based on my concerns about the bill being a violation of both Canada's Charter of Rights and our international obligations, in particular, the designation of certain claimants as irregular arrivals and creating a second class of refugee claimants who are subject to various severe measures, including potential detention for a year.

Members on the other side like to the point to the fact they have improved the bill because now children will not be kept with their parents in detention, but will be sent into some limbo outside detention.

The bar on applying for permanent residency status for five years means it would be very difficult to reunify families because individuals would also not be allowed to sponsor their families for five years and would have no access to the refugee appeals division.

It is also based on my general opposition to the new-speak we see again and again on the other side of the House in taking away the status of permanent resident, which would imply, once an individual is granted it, they would be allowed to stay in Canada permanently. Under the bill, a permanent resident would no longer mean permanent. It would be subject to a decision of the minister to decide whether individuals could stay in the country or whether they would have to go back. Individuals, having brought their family to safety, having established themselves in Canada, after an arbitrary decision by the minister, they could be forced to leave and return to that country and give up all the progress they have made in re-establishing their lives.

It is also based on my doubts about how we have come to have the bill in front of us. The previous bill, Bill C-11, passed in the previous Parliament, was a compromise between all parties working on the immigrant and refugee system, but it was never allowed to work.

What we have before us is another unfortunate example of what I call government by headlines and the politics of resentment. In particular, in Conservatives speeches we hear lots of reference to queue-jumping, to exploiting our generosity and playing on the emotions of Canadians about somehow, someone getting something to which he or she is not entitled.

The Conservatives like to pick the extreme examples. They like to pick the exceptions, which no one would support, and then attempt to make public policy on those exceptions.

I am also opposed to this because it is another case of a policy based on the concept of deterrence, which the government likes to use in criminal justice. It is a concept which has no basis in fact. Tough penalties would of course deter law abiding citizens. As one of the witnesses who appeared at the public safety committee said, “Yes, tough sentences deter you and me because we have something to lose. They deter all law-abiding citizens who understand the concept of community. They do not deter criminals”.

They certainly would not deter genuine refugees fleeing for their lives and they certainly would not deter the profiteers engaged in human smuggling. They already face maximum penalties of up to $1 million and life sentences. Therefore, if tough penalties were deterrents, we would see no human smuggling because there are no penalties bigger than that in the Canadian legal system.

However, make no mistake, I believe in deterrents based on what actually works. If we look at all the literature on criminal justice, it is the same things that also apply to refugee claimants. What works is the certainty of being caught and the swiftness of prosecution. Therefore, the certainty that a bogus claim would be identified and the speed with which that claim would be dealt with is what would deter those claims, not making restrictions on legitimate refugee claimants' rights and their ability to access the process.

The real solution is to apply more resources to the front end of our existing system so that those who make claims know that their claims will be dealt with in a matter of weeks or months, not a matter of years, and they know that bogus claims will not succeed in our system.

The government appears to set out some very nice targets in the bill that these new categories of refugees will have to meet, but in the absence of new resources the government will not meet those targets either. Therefore, we will pass a bill, which endangers the rights of many legitimate refugees, without achieving the swiftness the government claims will result from these measures because it will not have the resources in the system to actually accomplish this.

I will now turn to what I think is the most serious flaw in the bill, which is the process of designating certain countries as safe countries. This is a flawed concept and, once adopted, creates another second class of refugee claimants and provides severe restrictions on the rights of those who come from what is designated a safe country and on their ability to make effective refugee claims.

There was a compromise reached in the previous bill, Bill C-11, which said that safe countries could be designated, but it would be done by a panel of experts, not the minister, and the designation would allow for the exemption of certain geographic areas or certain classes of persons. We all know that there are certain countries where things are completely safe and other regions of the country where things might not be safe.

Under this bill, the designation of a country is either safe or not safe. It is safe for everyone in every place or it is not safe. The previous bill would have allowed the designation of women, in areas where violations of rights against women are rampant, as an exempted class, so the country might be safe for men but not for women. It would have allowed the designation of gays and lesbians, bisexuals and transgendered people, who are rarely safe in most countries around the world, as a class of people who could come from what was otherwise a safe country. The bill does not allow those designations of classes or geographic areas as exempt from the safe country designation.

Now I will turn to the particular situation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered refugees under the bill. I want to do so not just because I am a gay man and also an immigrant whose basic decision to move to Canada was, in large part, based on the criminalization of homosexuality in my country of origin at the time. It is a big part of why I stand here today. The safe country concept will have a disproportionate impact on these refugees from my community. Those coming from a designated safe country are required to make a claim within 15 days of arrival. In that 15 days they have to decide whether they would make a humanitarian and compassionate claim or a refugee claim. When I came, I would have had no idea what that meant, and in 15 days I would have had no ability to figure that out. I firmly believe that most refugees will be in that situation. As well, they have only 15 days to find legal representation. If they come from a society, and sometimes from a family, where declaring their sexuality meant great losses on a personal level and a great threat to their safety, they have only 15 days to change their mindset whether to go and talk to a stranger and confess everything that has happened in their personal life that caused them to become a refugee.

From personal experience, I can say that would have been very difficult for me to do. I know it is very difficult for the current lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered refugees.

There is a particularly large problem with the 15-day limit because the claimant would then appear before an adjudicator, a single individual who would have no knowledge of the situation of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered communities in the country of origin. Therefore, not only would individuals have to make their personal claim about their sexual orientation and how that made them unsafe, they would also have to demonstrate how their community was unsafe in their country as a whole. I doubt there are any refugees from the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered communities who would be able to do so in that 15-day period.

Without identifying the individual, I want to talk for a moment about a refugee who came from the Caribbean when he was 17 years old. His life was threatened when it was found out that he was gay. Every day he went to high school in a taxi, paid for by his aunt from Toronto so that he could finish high school at home. Then he was spirited to Canada. When he went to make a refugee claim, he did not want to talk about the personal experiences that made it necessary for him to flee. He did not want to confess to being gay even to his lawyer. It took six months for his lawyer to get the full story from him and then document what had happened to him in his country of origin. Therefore, to try to do that in 15 days is virtually impossible.

What is the real solution here? The Canadian Council for Refugees said scrap the bill. I certainly stand with it here today. The Canadian Bar Association has expressed its concerns about charter rights violations. Amnesty International said that the bill fell far short of Canada's international obligations.

What would I suggest? I would suggest that we go back to letting Bill C-11, the compromise bill, work and that we ensure the government provides a proper resource system so Canada can continue to be a safe place for refugees, genuine refugees, from around the world to make their home.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-11 attempted to deal with the backlog and had the support of all three political parties. It too attempted to deal with the backlog by speeding up the process. The member would find all party agreement on wanting to speed up the process.

If a 25 year-old comes here as a legitimate refugee and has done nothing wrong and is trying to save his own life by entering Canada, and is then told that he has to wait at least five years before he can sponsor his daughter or his son or his wife, he will be into his thirties before he can see the spouse he left behind because someone was trying to kill or torture him.

Is that fair?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Madam Speaker, we have gone from the most thoughtful and informed opposition speech on the bill to the most unthoughtful and uninformed speech that was filled with complete falsehoods and outrageous suggestions.

For example, there was the notion that we would seek to deny due process and would violate charter rights for would-be asylum claimants from designated countries. In fact, the bill would guarantee access to an independent quasi-judicial hearing on the merits of an individual claim for all asylum claimants regardless of the nature of the country they came from or the manner in which they arrived in Canada. That exceeds both our charter and UN convention obligations. What the safe country claimants would not have is access to the refugee appeal division, which the Liberals refused to give any failed asylum claimants.

The member referred to immigration detention as jail. However, she was part of a government for 13 years that maintained immigration detention.

She said that Canada would reject people like those on the St. Louis. Under this law, they would have access to our fair and independent quasi-judicial asylum process. They would not have been sent back the way a former Liberal government did.

She said that we are denying people access to humanitarian and compassionate consideration for one year after a failed asylum claim. She voted for that provision in Bill C-11 in the last Parliament.

She said that the Vietnamese would be placed under detention. No, they went to UNHCR camps overseas and waited their turn to be resettled in Canada.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Fourth party, indeed. How quickly we forget.

We took the lead in negotiating with the government to make Bill C-11 more palatable by requiring that before the minister designate a country as a safe country of origin, that he or she consult an advisory committee.

We have been working to protect the rights of refugees, and we will continue to do so.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Madam Speaker, my colleague spoke mainly on the refugee aspect of this bill. I point out that Liberals were in government for 13 years and did nothing about creating some sort of further refugee protection. The New Democrats have continuously been calling for more further refugee protection, especially the Refugee Appeal Division. In the previous iteration of the bill we had agreement on this. Yet the minister, instead of letting Bill C-11 go through to fruition and seeing its impacts on society, has decided to quash it and have this omnibus bill.

Would the member please comment on that?

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Vancouver Centre.

In a speech he delivered in the House when Bill C-4 was introduced, the Minister of Immigration said that we needed this bill's harsh measures against asylum seekers in order to communicate to them in no uncertain terms that Canada's streets were not paved with gold and that Canada was not the place for them.

As a case in point, the minister said that asylum seekers believe they will be given $50,000 upon arrival in Canada. We know this, obviously, is not the case. There are no such pots of gold awaiting refugee claimants at Canadian border points. This false and, ultimately, disappointing picture for asylum seekers of the easy prosperity that supposedly lies at the end of a long, arduous and sometimes deadly boat trip across the seas has been attracting the world's poor, persecuted and downtrodden to North America for well over a century. As well as the very real promise of freedom, this has been a point of attraction for immigrants and refugees who desperately seek a better life free from violence or squalor.

I do not think the minister's speech nor the bill would change this fact. We also need to realize that there is a flaw in the argument that Bill C-4, which is now part of Bill C-31, somehow will discourage people from coming to Canada.

The minister assumes that we live in a world of perfect information as the neo-classical economists regularly assure us in their economic models, but the fact is that would-be asylum seekers are fundamentally unaware of what awaits them here beyond the images they have borne of a hope they often desperately cling to. Indeed, not even the minister can extinguish the hope that is, in some ways, the psychological and emotional sustenance on which many people around the world living in harsh conditions survive.

It is a given that asylum seekers have a distorted view of the benefits that await them here in this country. There is no $50,000 pot of gold that awaits them when they arrive here. The corollary of course is that they also have a distorted view of any negative consequences that might await them should they arrive as refugee claimants aided and abetted by human smugglers. They cannot be expected to have accurate knowledge of the measures in Bill C-31, the measures imported from Bill C-4, that have been created in an attempt to discourage asylum seekers from coming to Canada.

Not only are would-be asylum seekers misinformed about what awaits them in Canada but many Canadians who have access to the 24-hour news cycle and who are generally well informed are themselves unaware of the manner in which Canada treats refugees upon arrival. I am sure many members in the House have received a chain email which I have been receiving if for about eight years now. I have been getting this email from highly educated Canadians, friends of mine, good people, good Liberals who believe in individual rights and who want fair treatment of immigrants and refugees. However, because it comes in on the Internet there is a tendency to take it at face value. I will quote from the email I have been receiving and that many members have been receiving. Only in Canada. It says:

It is interesting to know that the federal Government of Canada allows a monthly pension of $1,890 to a simple refugee, plus $580 in social aid for a grand total of $2,470 monthly. That’s $28,920 in annual income.

By comparison the Old Age Pension of a senior citizen who has contributed to the development of Our Beautiful Big Country during 40 or 50 years cannot receive more than $1,012 in Old Age Pension and Guaranteed Income Supplement per month, for $12,144 in annual income.

That’s a difference of $16,776 per year.

Perhaps our senior citizens should ask for the Status of Refugees instead of applying for Old Age Pension.

That is what is circulating on the Internet here in Canada. It is so false, so prevalent and so ongoing as a form of a spam email that the Department of Immigration has actually put up a web page to try to clarify the situation.

There is a lot of misinformation both in Canada and overseas where people are getting their information from human smugglers about what awaits them here. That is true of the false benefits that await them. If we assume that, which is what the Minister of Immigration said, people think they are coming here to a pot of gold of $50,000 when they arrive, that somehow officers from the Canada Border Services Agency await asylum seekers with chequebook and pen in hand, we also have to assume that would-be asylum seekers do not know what is in Bill C-31. They do not know what was in Bill C-4. They will not be discouraged by the harsh measures in Bill C-31. Who will tell them about the harsh measures in Bill C-31. Will it be the human smugglers? Will the human smugglers tell them that they will take their money, that they will bring them over to Canada, then tell them about the new legislation that may put them in detention for a year and say that maybe they will not do that human smuggling deal after all? There is a flaw in that logic.

We all view legislation through the prisms of our respective political philosophies. For me and others in the House that prism is liberalism. Liberalism is fundamentally about the primacy of the rights and dignity of the individual. Of course, liberals recognize and understand that human beings are social animals, that we can only thrive in a group or community. Living in a group or community makes everything possible, including individual economic prosperity. A simple example is the real estate value of one's home is a function of the vibrancy of the community in which it lies: no community, no capital gain upon home resale.

Community is not only the context necessary for individual fulfillment and security. It is also a source of identity. Liberals believe in the inherent value of community, but neither Conservatives nor the NDP spread misinformation on this point. Liberals are communitarians. We believe in safe streets, believe it or not. We believe in social cohesion and maintaining the social fabric.

Where we differ from the Conservatives is that we put the individual first. In a court of law or in an administrative tribunal, the focus is on the individual, not the group to which he or she belongs. In matters of justice, when we have to judge, we believe that we must judge based on the individual's unique circumstances, not the circumstances of the larger and more amorphous group to which he or she may happen to belong.

As an aside, that is why we as Liberals have trouble with minimum sentencing. We believe the circumstances of the crime and the offender must be evaluated, namely by a judge with years of legal training and experience because, as Liberals, we believe in the power of reason to find as close an approximation of the truth as we can. We believe in the ability of judges to apply reason to the facts of the case and develop a sanction that is proper to the individual circumstances, including one that is just to the victims. We believe in victims' rights.

That is also why we object to judging a refugee claimant based primarily on his or her group affiliation or country of origin. We do not believe that a refugee's treatment at the hands of the Canadian government should be judged as a function of their country of origin, in other words, on the basis of their nationality essentially, anymore than on their race or ethnicity.

I will quote Audrey Maklin of the University of Toronto's Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights, and lawyer, Lorne Waldman, both in regard to Bill C-31's predecessor, Bill C-4. They state:

The legislation also gives the minister the power to decree certain countries as “safe.” This formalizes in law the presumption that a refugee claimant from one of these countries is a fraud. Many countries are safe for most people most of the time. Refugees are usually people who are marginalized and vulnerable, so designating a country as safe tells us nothing about the risks faced by the people likely--

[Hélène LeBlanc, NDP, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-31 threatens this common vision of hope and our collective desire to build a nation where compassion is the rule, a nation that opens its arms and offers a fair opportunity to those seeking asylum, safety and protection.

I must state clearly that Bill C-31 puts aside all the hard negotiated and balanced compromise on immigration reform that all parties, including the government, worked to achieve in the previous Parliament in former Bill C-11.

Unfortunately, the balance and the compromises that were achieved at the time have disappeared. Instead of punishing human smugglers, Bill C-31 attacks the refugees who are the victims of these unscrupulous people. Even more worrisome, the minister is giving himself certain powers that will jeopardize a system that must be fair and must honour international conventions.

Under Bill C-31, the minister will establish a list of safe countries and a list of countries that are considered unsafe. What is troubling is that this list will be established by the minister, rather than by a panel of experts in international relations, not to mention that this list will change depending on his assessment of the safety of the countries on that list.

In the previous more balanced immigration reform act, Bill C-11, the decision on whether or not a country was safe was left to a board of human rights advisers, not a minister with a red pen.

Perhaps most troubling of all, Bill C-31's unbalanced approach to immigration reform enables the minister to revoke the permanent resident status of former refugee claimants if the minister decides that their country of origin is no longer threatening.

There are many permanent residents that have made my riding their home. It can take years for someone to obtain permanent resident status, as many of my constituents know. Imagine the anxiety they would feel, how vulnerable they would be to know that the minister could revoke their status on a whim, just as they have begun to rebuild their lives.

In the meantime, these constituents have settled in Montreal. They have made friendships and have married. They have worked hard to make a living so that one day their children can go to school, college and university, and participate in our society. They have come to build lives and share in the prosperity and security that too many of us born here take for granted.

My colleagues know as well as I do that when the government makes rash decisions, our constituency offices are the first to hear about it. Our constituents turn to us when they can no longer count on government services, for example, because the delays have become untenable or because the process has become fundamentally unfair.

We respond to calls from our constituents who hope to be reunited with a spouse overseas and who, after months and years, can no longer wait and confess to us that their marriage is about to fall apart. We open our doors to mothers who come with their children, begging us to intervene because they are about to be deported in less than two hours and they are overtaken by desperation.

Decisions made by governments have very real and very human consequences, often far from Ottawa; we see that every day. The government needs to put more resources into processing requests, well-trained human resources that can meet the demand.

Bill C-31 epitomizes this government's callous vision of a society made up of two classes of citizens: good Canadians and those whom the Conservatives consider profiteers.

It is no accident that Canada is called the “new world”. Our country is a land of immigrants, a land that welcomes immigrants, a beacon of safety and hope and opportunity for a better life. That is the Canada whose values I stand for.

That is why I am urging the government to forget about Bill C-31, as it forgot about its predecessor, Bill C-4. I am asking the government not to repudiate the historic compromises that all parties achieved when they reformed our immigration system by passing Bill C-11 during the previous Parliament.

Those are the reasons why I oppose Bill C-31.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to pick up on the point which the member has referenced.

Bill C-11 passed with the unanimous support of the parties in this chamber. One of the reasons for that support was that there was agreement that an advisory committee was needed which would ultimately provide recommendations to the minister for determining which countries around the world would be listed as safe countries.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, New Democrats recognize and respect our responsibilities to refugees, unlike the Conservatives who have taken an approach that would damage Canada's reputation internationally.

It is good that the minister is in the House. It was interesting for me to go over some of the notes on Bill C-11. The minister not only praised, but called it a miracle, that all parties had worked together to develop Bill C-11. That bill was passed in the last Parliament.

Why is the minister moving away from that? Where is he going? Bill C-11 was passed with the consensus of the House.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time.

I rise today to speak to Bill C-31, an act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, the Marine Transportation Security Act and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Act.

Before I get to that, we have heard in the House that in the previous Parliament, Bill C-11 was passed. I want to quote what a member of the government was saying at that time. He said:

I am pleased to report that the proposed reforms in the original version of Bill C-11 received widespread support. However, many concerns were raised in good faith by parliamentarians and others concerned about Canada's asylum system. We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

Who said that? The current Minister of Citizenship and Immigration. I quote him further. He said, “I am happy to say, create a reform package that is both faster and fairer than the bill as it was originally tabled”. He even praised how parties worked together to reach consensus and come up with that bill that worked for all parties. He went on to say, “Miracles happen”.

He further went on to say that the government took constructive criticism into account and recognized the need to work together. That was just a year ago. That was Bill C-11. All of the parties worked together to come to a consensus that would deal with some of the issues such as backlogs, having a fairer system for refugees, and so forth. He went on further to say, “The reforms we are proposing should have been implemented a long time ago”.

What has changed since June 2010 until now? Is it because the Conservatives got their slim majority and they are bringing out their hidden agenda? Instead of catching the smugglers, now they want to punish the refugees.

I will outline my concerns in regards to Bill C-31.

Bill C-31 is basically an omnibus refugee reform bill that combines the worst parts of the former Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act, from the last Parliament, with Bill C-4, , preventing human smuggling, from this Parliament. It has basically three main purposes: a repeal of most of the compromises from former Bill C-11. It reintroduces Bill C-4, preventing human smuggling, which targets refugees instead of the smugglers. It introduces the collection of biometrics for temporary residents.

Bill C-31 would concentrate more power in the hands of the minister by allowing him to name safe countries and restrict refugees from those countries. Under the former bill, Bill C-11, this was to be done by a panel of experts, including human rights experts. Refugee claimants from safe countries would face extremely short timelines before hearings, 15 days. They would have no access to the Refugee Appeal Division in the event of a bad judgment. They would have no automatic stay of removal when filing for a judicial review and could not apply for a work permit for 180 days. It would also limit access and shorten timelines to file and submit a pre-removal risk assessment application and evidence.

Not only would the minister have the discretion to designate countries of origin, safe countries, the minister would also have the power to designate a group as an irregular arrival and determine what condition would be placed on those designated as refugee claimants.

Let us take a look at the designated countries of origin, DCOs. Designated countries of origin would be countries which the minister believes do not produce legitimate refugees, usually because they are developed democracies. The designated countries of origin would be decided by the minister, not by experts as was previously agreed to with the consensus of all parties.

Refugee claimants from the designated countries of origin would face a much faster determination process and a faster deportation for failed claims. Furthermore, an initial form would be filed in within 15 days.

Failed designated countries of origin claimants could be removed from Canada almost immediately, even if they asked for a judicial review. In other words, a person could be removed before his or her review was heard. DCO claimants would have no access to the new refugee appeal division.

There are a number of concerns with this. The accelerated timeline of 15 days would make it difficult for people to get proper legal representation. This could lead to mistakes and subsequently a negative decision. Legal experts have warned that these accelerated timeframes and restricted access to the refugee appeal division would create an unfair system.

Furthermore, the effect of the accelerated deportation would mean that people would be removed from the country before the legal process had run its course. The refugee appeal division should be available to all claimants.

There are also concerns in regard to changes to the humanitarian and compassionate consideration. The humanitarian and compassionate consideration is a tool whereby a person can stay in Canada despite not being eligible on other grounds. Under Bill C-31, claimants waiting for an IRB decision could not apply for humanitarian and compassionate consideration at the same time. A person would have to choose at the beginning whether he or she wanted to file for refugee status or for humanitarian or compassionate consideration.

Failed refugee claimants could not apply for humanitarian and compassionate consideration for one year following a negative decision, by which time they would likely be deported.

There are a number of concerns with this aspect of the bill. This strips much of the usefulness from the humanitarian and compassionate consideration. Humanitarian and compassionate consideration is a very important tool in our immigration system. Many people whose refugee was claim denied could nonetheless have a legitimate claim on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. Therefore, a failed refugee claim should not get in the way of humanitarian and compassionate consideration.

Another part of this bill that concerns me is clause 19(1) which adds new language into the loss of status section for permanent residents. It adds that existing criteria for ceasing refugee protection can be a reason to lose permanent residency status. Included in the list is if the reasons for which the person sought refugee protection have ceased to exist.

In summary, there are many concerns with this bill. The new bill does not address some of the needs of our current system. The Conservatives are playing politics with refugees, and concentrating excessive and arbitrary powers in the hands of the minister. The Conservatives continually frame their draconian legislation in terms of bogus refugees and those abusing the system, but what they are really doing is punishing refugees with ineffective measures that will not stop human smuggling.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, just over a year ago, the minister of immigration brought in Bill C-11 that, with the support of Liberals and New Democrats, ultimately passed. It was supposed to deal with the backlogs and streamline the system. The member even made reference to that bill.

Did the government mess up that badly that it had to reintroduce more legislation, when it did not implement the previous legislation even though it passed the House of Commons? Did that legislation not address the issues which, at one point in time, the minister of immigration told Canadians the bill would resolve the problems? It is like conceding the fact that the minister messed up the first time around. That is the way I think most people would interpret it.

[Matthew Kellway, NDP, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as yet another member of the citizenship and immigration committee, I am pleased to stand and talk to Bill C-31, although I am disappointed to have to do so under time allocation.

Bill C-11 of the previous Parliament, which Bill C-31 seeks to replace, is due to come into effect in June 2012, a mere three months from now. Bill C-11 was a product of a minority Parliament, but according to the minister, it was also the product of good faith, something that should guide the way that all Parliaments, minority and majority alike, function.

The minister told Canadians that he listened to all the speeches on Bill C-11 and that:

During the debates and consultations, the government took constructive criticism into account and recognized the need to work together with the opposition to design a bill that reflected the parliamentary consensus.

What emerged from this approach to developing legislation, according to the minister himself, was “a stronger piece of legislation...a bill that is both faster and fairer than the bill as it was originally tabled”.

That progress, that monumental achievement for all involved, as the minister once described Bill C-11, is now about to revert to the slower, less fair, weaker piece of legislation in the form of Bill C-31 and the collective wisdom that informed Bill C-11 all but erased. What is left is a bill characterized by a terrible irony.

This is a bill that is meant to set out how to treat people who have fled their country of origin on the basis of persecution or fear of persecution on grounds that are protected by human rights laws and convention. Yet this is a bill that is dismissive, if not actually contemptuous of the rights and freedoms that Canadians and citizens of many other countries around the world feel are fundamental.

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom, for example, is not reflected in the bill. Bill C-31 carries over from Bill C-4 the power of the minister to create a second, or in the terms of the bill, a “designated” class of refugee that face mandatory detention upon arrival. Such detention in the absence of good reason and sound process clashes with section 7 of our charter, which provides for the right to life, liberty and security of the person.

Further, group detention of refugees implies the detention of individuals without specific assessment and therefore grounds. Such arbitrary detention raises a violation of section 9 of our charter, and that is the right not to be arbitrarily detained or imprisoned.

The fact that there is no review of the detention for at least 12 months raises further issues. Section 10 of the charter requires that everyone arrested or detained has the right to be informed promptly of the reasons therefore, retain and instruct counsel and to be informed of that right, to have the validity of the detention determined within 48 hours and to be released if the detention is not lawful.

These are not the rights and freedoms of Canadians alone. They are what we call “human rights” and we consider them to be inalienable. In the language of our charter, they “belong to everyone”.

Long before our charter, we were signatories to the Charter of the United Nations. As a signatory to the UN charter, we reaffirmed our “faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small...”

What follows is our signature on a number of United Nations declarations and conventions and our participation in that organization all for the purpose of putting these beliefs into practice. Most relevant to today's debate is the International Bill of Human Rights, the Convention and Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Today I would like to focus on the latter and the treatment of children under Bill C-31.

Bill C-31, as we know, reintroduces Bill C-4 to the House with some minor changes. One of those changes is with respect to the treatment of children in that Bill C-31 does not commit children to detention, but nor does it say what becomes of the kids who arrive in a group that the minister declares irregular.

International declarations with respect to the rights of the child go back almost a century. Over this time, what has remained constant in the successive iterations of such rights and the recognition that: children embody human rights; that they are entitled to special safeguards, care and assistance, including appropriate legal protection; that, “for the full and harmonious development of the child”, they should grow up in a family environment.

And finally, and therefore:

...the family, as the fundamental group of society and the natural environment for the growth and well-being of all its members and particularly children, should be afforded the necessary protection and assistance....

Such consideration and commitments to children and their families who form part of an irregular arrival are nowhere to be found in Bill C-31.

Interestingly, and hopefully instructively, others have gone before us to measure the impacts of mandatory detention of child refugees against the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Australia, as the government side will know, has a mandatory immigration detention system. It applies to children who arrive in Australia without a visa, so-called “unauthorized arrivals”. The Australian Human Rights Commission studied the impacts of this system and concluded that this system breached the following convention provisions: article 37(b) and (d), which is to ensure that detention is a measure of last resort for the shortest period of time and subject to effective independent review; article 3.1, which is to ensure that the best interests of the child are of primary consideration in all actions concerning children; article 37(c), which is to ensure that children are treated with humanity and respect for their inherent dignity; and article 22.1, article 6.2 and article 39, which all protect the right of children to receive appropriate assistance, to ensure recovery from torture and trauma, to live in an environment which fosters health, self-respect and dignity, and to enjoy to the maximum extent possible their right to development.

It further found that children in immigration detention for long periods of time were at high risk of serious mental harm and that the failure of its country, Australia, to remove kids from the detention environment with their parents amounted to cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of those children in detention.

In short, the commission recommended the release of children with their parents and that immigration detention laws be compliant with the convention and based on a presumption against the detention of children for immigration purposes.

I have taken this time to review the findings of the Australian Human Rights Commission because it is a cautionary tale. Australia has gone before us down this path of immigration detention and, if it were not already obvious, there is at least now laid at the feet of the government more than ample evidence to suggest that it proceed with the detention of children and their parents in full understanding that such action is in conflict with the Convention on the Rights of the Child and causes harm to children and their families.

It is, in part, I am sure, because for our historic commitment to human rights, that from time to time people end up on our shores seeking safe haven or asylum from persecution and yet Bill C-31 proposes to deny to others the very rights and freedoms that define this country for ourselves and in the international community and make us so proud to be citizens of it.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Beaches—East York.

I rise today to add my strongest objection to Bill C-31, the Protecting Canada's Immigration System act. I find it ironic that the bill would be given this title. It would do anything but protect our immigration system. In fact, the bill would set out to dismantle our immigration system, damaging it legally, socially, morally and internationally. I find the omnibus nature of the bill very disturbing.

This particular bill groups together two major pieces of legislation, Bill C-4, the Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System act, and C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform act from the last Parliament. Then it introduces the mandatory collection of biometrics for temporary residents. These are three major issues that deserve adequate attention and debate.

I have already stood in the House and expressed my strong objection to C-4, yet components of the bill reappear here in C-31. The bill would attack refugees rather than human smugglers. By placing an overwhelming amount of power in the hands of the minister, the bill would allow the minister to designate a group of refugees as an irregular arrival. If the minister believed, for example, that examination for establishing identity could not be conducted in a timely manner, or if it were suspected that the people were being smuggled for profit, or a criminal organization or terrorist group was involved in the smuggling, designated claimants would then be subjected to a number of rules. They would be mandatorily detained on arrival, or on designation by the minister, with no review by the Immigration and Refugee Board for their detention for a year. Release would only be possible if they were found to be true refugees. If the Immigration and Refugee Board ordered their release within a year, even then the Immigration and Refugee Board could not release people if the government said their identities had not been established, or if the minister decided that there were exceptional circumstances.

Decisions on claims by designated persons could not be appealed to the Refugee Appeal Division. A designated person could not make humanitarian and compassionate applications. A designated claimant could not apply for permanent residency for five years. If the person failed to comply with the conditions or reporting requirements, that five year suspension could be extended to six years.

This raises a number of concerns. First, this is extremely discriminatory as it would create two classes of refugee claimants: real refugees and designated claimants. This is possibly a violation of the Canadian Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms' equality rights, as well as the refugee convention, which prohibits states from imposing penalties on refugees for illegal entry or presence.

Second, detention without review is a clear violation of the charter rights. The Supreme Court already struck down mandatory detention without review on security certificates. This legislation would imply indefinite detention on the basis of identity with no possibility of release until the minister decided that identity had been established. Arbitrary detention is also a violation of a number of international treaties.

Third, designated persons would have no access to the Refugee Appeal Division. This means that these claimants would not have the right to an appeal, thereby removing any system of checks and balances.

Additionally, the mandatory five year delay in applying for permanent residency would further delay the family reunification process, forcing claimants to wait eight to ten years to be reunited with their spouse or child living overseas. Last, this legislation would create an undue barrier for humanitarian and compassionate claims. I am extremely concerned with the idea that the minister could name someone a designated claimant based on irregular arrival with no explanation of what constitutes an irregular arrival.

If we look at the history of the legislation of this nature, introduced by this government, we can see that it has glaring resemblances to Bill C-49 in the last Parliament.

Bill C-49 was hastily drafted by the government when Canadians witnessed the spectre of boats coming to the shores of British Columbia, carrying some of the most damaged and wounded people on earth. These were people fleeing, as the minister has rightly pointed out, one of the worst civil wars in the world, in Sri Lanka. Never ones to pass off a good photo op, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism and the Minister of Public Safety were in British Columbia, holding news conferences where they publicly accused the people on these boats of being bogus refugees, harbouring terrorists and trying to jump the immigration queues. They called these people “queue jumpers”.

I find this extremely confusing. The government seems to be speaking out of both sides of its mouth. On one hand, we have the Minister of Foreign Affairs referring to the Sri Lankan civil war as a great atrocity where numerous war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed. On the other hand, we have the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism and the Minister of Public Safety accusing people fleeing this very violence of being bogus. This is completely absurd. Which one is it?

Some of the refugee claimants and the refugees who arrived on the MV Sun Sea now live in my riding of Scarborough—Rouge River. Many of them have told me stories of their trip to Canada and their arrival in British Columbia. Many of them had UNHCR refugee cards. Upon their arrival, the people who greeted them gathered all of their refugee cards. When there was not the same number of cards as people, all the people aboard were told that they had not presented adequate identification and documentation when they came. Regardless of whether they had refugee cards, they were all detained. Thankfully, many of these people have now been released, but some are still in detention. Some of these people who had refugee cards are still being detained.

I am going to go back to the idea of an irregular arrival. This concept is not defined in this legislation. Based on the history of this bill, it is easy to jump to the conclusion that irregular arrival means arrival by boat. This bill is essentially saying that people who arrive in an irregular fashion, or by boat, are not refugees but rather are criminals. This bill is saying that people who wish to flee war, conflict or persecution but do not have the means to pay for a plane ticket so instead risk their lives by throwing themselves onto a rickety cargo boat and spending months crossing an ocean are not real refugees. No, the government is saying they are criminals. They are not real asylum seekers. They are not really fleeing a horrible situation, leaving behind their homes, livelihood and families with hopes of creating a better life here in Canada. No, these people are criminals. This is what this bill and the government are telling us.

Furthermore, if they fail to provide adequate identification, they can be detained without review. Most refugees who come to Canada do not have documentation, regardless of which process is used to enter the country. When people flee their home nation, they leave everything behind. How can we expect people who have left a war-torn country to carry valid identification? This concept of queue jumping, as the minister likes to say, is completely bogus. These people still must go through the same immigration process as any other immigrant to Canada. When people are fleeing persecution or war, they cannot be called queue jumpers. For refugees, there is no queue to jump. There is no lineup for people who are in serious danger; people living through a civil war; or people being persecuted because of their gender, religion, sexual orientation, et cetera. When people's lives or the lives of their families are called into question, there is no line. These people must leave their country immediately. Once they are safely here in Canada, they must joint the same queue as everyone else who wants to gain some sort of status in our country.

The second part of this bill comprises of Bill C-11, from the last Parliament, and the calling of safe countries. In the 40th Parliament, after a lot of work and compromises, Bill C-11 passed this House with all-party support. It was scheduled to come into effect this spring. However, before the legislation that was passed by this House could even have a chance to come into effect, the members opposite have including the original legislation, Bill C-11, excluding any part of the amendments that were accepted by all parties, in this current omnibus bill. The government has not even given the original Bill C-11 from the last Parliament a chance to work.

The Conservatives are using fear-mongering and fear tactics to scare the current immigrants in Canada and current Canadians. They are pitting Canadians against immigrants and new immigrants against other newer immigrants. This type of fear tactics is absolutely wrong.

Bill C-31--Time Allocation Motion

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we now know how this government operates. To this government, winning a majority spelled the end of debates and the beginning of installing its ideology. It figured it had four to four and a half years to pass everything it was unable to pass when it had a minority. We know that.

Now, the public is suffering the consequences. Workers are seeing their rights violated. We see what the government did with Air Canada. It has gotten to the point where special legislation is introduced before there is even a dispute. That is pretty bad; it is unheard of.

I imagine this government will never cease to amaze us, even if, here in Parliament, we are less and less surprised.

My question for the minister is quite simple. He was the one who ensured that the opposition parties and his government could manage to work together to draft a bill on refugees, namely Bill C-11, that was acceptable to everyone. Then he simply decided to scrap the whole thing and come up with Bill C-31.

He accuses the opposition of wanting to stall, but why did the government not reintroduce Bill C-11? Everyone agreed on it and there would have been no systematic obstruction.

[Matthew Kellway, NDP, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very disappointed to see the government invoking time allocation for the 18th time in the very short life of this Parliament.

More than that, I am a bit dizzy watching the minister flip-flop back and forth on this issue of the value of debate in this House. There was a time, it seems, when the minister did not use filibuster and debate in this House as synonyms. I go back to the debate around Bill C-11. The minister is on record and I would like to quote his comments about the development of Bill C-11. He said in June 2010:

I am pleased to report that the proposed reforms in the original version of Bill C-11 received widespread support. However, many concerns were raised in good faith by parliamentarians and others concerned about Canada's asylum system. We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

I would like to hear from the minister how he reconciles those comments made in June 2010 with his support for time allocation today.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for her comments and question.

I just want to remind the House that in the former Bill C-11, there was the possibility of having a committee, including human rights experts, meet in order to make this designation.

I think that in a democratic country, it is important to ensure that these powers are not given unilaterally to one person, but that a committee makes this type of decision in a transparent and impartial fashion.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Laurentides—Labelle.

A policy without justice is an inadequate policy. Bill C-31 completely jeopardizes refugee rights. Never in human history have refugee rights been as threatened as they are under the Conservatives and never has our democracy been as discredited as it is under the Conservative government, which is unable to respect the compromises reached in consensus with the other parties.

The government seems to forget that our ratification of international conventions on refugee rights and human rights requires us to bring our laws and policies into line with the provisions of these international conventions.

Canada is a signatory to the 1951 Geneva Convention on Refugees. Bill C-31, intended to protect Canada's immigration system, respects neither the spirit nor the letter of the Geneva convention. Having read the bill, one wonders whether the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, adopted by the House in 1982, is still in effect in Canada.

Let us not forget that Bill C-31 is an omnibus bill, which seeks to amend the Immigration Refugee Protection Act by unfortunately incorporating into Bill C-4 the most unreasonable provisions of the former Bill C-11, which received royal assent in June 2010.

The government had three main goals in mind for this bill: revoking the majority of the compromises included in the former Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which received support from all the parties; reintroducing Bill C-4, the Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act; and finally, introducing the use of biometrics into the temporary resident program.

Bill C-31 raises some serious concerns in addition to the those already raised by Bill C-4, the unconstitutional nature of which we have raised and highlighted in our previous interventions.

In my speech today, I would like to draw the attention of the House to some of the concerns that Bill C-31 raises. In reaction to the introduction of Bill C-31, the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers says that like the sorry Bill C-10, Bill C-31 is extremely complicated.

The most draconian measures in Bill C-4 have been integrated into Bill C-31. Let us look at a few examples. Bill C-4 provided for mandatory detention for one year for people fleeing persecution in their country of origin and entering Canada without identity documents in their possession. Also, Bill C-4 eliminated review of detention for refugees who are smuggled into Canada.

The provisions pertaining to detention found in Bill C-4, which are being reintroduced in Bill C-31, are a direct violation of our Constitution. Furthermore, the jurisprudence constante of the Supreme Court is categorical in this regard.

Why are the Conservatives attempting to put themselves above the rule of law, which is a key principle of our democracy, even though they are familiar with the precedents of our high court? Why are they attempting to mislead the House by proposing that it pass laws that they know violate not only our Constitution, but also the Canadian charter and human rights conventions that our country has signed? Pacta sunt servanda is a principle of international law. Signed conventions have to be respected.

Furthermore, lawyers specializing in refugee rights have said that they are deeply troubled by the short time frames that Bill C-31 gives refugee claimants to seek Canada's protection. They find that Bill C-31 drastically changes Canada's refugee protection system and makes it unfair. Bill C-31 imposes unrealistic time frames and unattainable deadlines on refugee claimants and uses the claimants' inability to meet those deadlines to exclude them from protection.

In fact, under the terms of Bill C-31, refugee claimants have only 15 days to overcome the trauma of persecution, find a lawyer to help them, gather the documentary evidence to support their allegations, obtain proof of identity from their country, scrape together the money for legal fees, present an articulate and coherent account of their life, and so forth.

Is there a woman who has been raped and traumatized who would be willing to tell her story to a stranger? I am a psychologist and I know that is impossible in the time provided.

Unsuccessful refugee claimants will have 15 days within which to file an appeal under Bill C-31. As everyone can see, the time frames imposed on refugee claimants are not long enough to allow them to make full answer and defence.

Under our justice system, the greater the risk to life, the longer the time frames given to the person being tried to prepare his defence. Bill C-31 does not respect this principle of fundamental justice.

I am also deeply concerned not only about the new term—designated country of origin—that Bill C-31 introduces into our legislation but also about the undemocratic nature of the process for designating the countries in question. Under Bill C-31, the minister alone has the power to designate safe countries of origin, without first defining the designation criteria for these countries.

According to the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, the designated safe country list and the unilateral power granted to the minister dangerously politicize Canada's refugee system.

Refugee claimants who are on a designated safe country list have even less time to submit their written arguments and will not be allowed an appeal.

Bill C-31 also relieves the minister of the obligation of justifying why a country is safe and considering the differential risks that certain minorities face in a country that is safe for others.

If Bill C-31 is passed, refugees will become more vulnerable because their fate will depend on the political whims of the minister and the government. Failed claimants from designated countries of origin can be deported from Canada almost immediately, even if they have requested a judicial review of the decision. In other words, a person can be deported before his case is heard.

This shows us that the government has no understanding at all of the Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, which was adopted on July 28, 1951. The convention insists that the individual concerns of victims of persecution be taken into account. The Geneva convention does not state anywhere that international protection is granted to the victim of persecution based on the country in which the persecution was experienced.

Persecution of religious minorities does not occur solely in non-democratic countries, nor does discrimination based on sexual orientation occur solely in non-democratic countries. Race-based persecution can happen anywhere in the world. All signatories to the European Convention on Human Rights are democratic countries, but the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights is teeming with rulings that condemn democratic states for abuses of individual rights.

If that is the case, by what objective criteria can the minister deny a person international protection based on the fact that he or she is from a particular country and claims to have been persecuted because of his or her sexual orientation or religion?

The process of designating countries of origin is not carried out by an independent, democratic entity. The government is judge and jury. It has the power to designate countries of origin considered safe, and it has the power to refuse protection provided for in the Geneva convention on refugee status without examining the merits of a given case.

I would also point out that under subclause 19(1) of Bill C-31, the government can, if it chooses, withdraw the international protection due to victims of persecution on the grounds that circumstances have changed in the refugee's country of origin. Under this provision, the government could now decide to send people to whom it granted international protection during the first and second world wars, for example, back to their countries of origin.

Subclause 19(1) also adds new terms to the section concerning loss of permanent resident status. It states that the existing criteria for withdrawing protection from asylum seekers can be grounds for loss of permanent resident status.

I will conclude with one final concern about changes that Bill C-31 makes to claims made on humanitarian grounds. Such claims enable a person to stay in Canada even if he or she is not eligible on other grounds. Unfortunately, under Bill C-31, applicants awaiting a refugee appeal division decision cannot simultaneously apply on humanitarian grounds.

This bill is unjust and cruel. It is antithetical to Canadian values of compassion for victims of persecution, and it must be defeated.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Madam Speaker, when Bill C-11 was passed and we anticipated an implementation date of June 29 of this year, there was an expectation that we would have rooted out the issues of false claimants, that we would have put a process in place that would have exemplified to individuals thinking about claiming refugee status in Canada that if they did not have a true refugee claim, they would not be welcome in Canada, or it would not be approved and would be done so in a very expeditious manner.

What we learned, whether it was through crooked consultants or advice from individuals who understand how to manipulate and work around our process, is that they were not being scared off or they did not see the fear in applying in Canada. They simply found additional loopholes. Bill C-31 would eliminate, once and for all, the loopholes that allow bogus refugee claimants to come to Canada to seek refugee status. In fact, we will be assisting those who truly need help.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Madam Speaker, it continues to boggle my mind that the opposition keeps suggesting that there are two levels of refugees in the world. That is wrong. There is only one. There are those who seek asylum and deserve it, and there are those who seek asylum and do not deserve it.

I appreciate the fact that the member works extremely hard on the immigration committee, and I respect her being here this afternoon, but she was not here in the previous Parliament when we passed Bill C-11 and moved toward a more balanced approach. Bill C-31 would make the process of safe country more transparent and more accountable. How that process would work is spelled out in the legislation and regulation, as is how and when the minister would be able to undertake the issue of safe country.

I come back to the original point of what the refugee system in this country is supposed to be about. It is supposed to be about assisting those who genuinely need the help of this country to seek a new life, to seek a new country and to seek new opportunity but it is for those who deserve it, not for those who attempt to get it under bogus means.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Madam Speaker, this bill gives the minister alone all the power to determine which countries are safe, while in the former Bill C-11, that task belonged to a panel of experts that included human rights specialists. Bill C-11 was sponsored by the Minister of Immigration at the time.

Why is the government creating two classes of refugees and how can it guarantee that any single country in the world is completely safe from persecution?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Madam Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I rise to speak to Bill C-31.

First, there are a couple of aspects that were brought up by the critics from the Liberal Party and the NDP with regard to Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform legislation which was passed in the last Parliament. They claimed that bill is on hold, that it has not been implemented and that no acts within that bill have actually been processed. I want to clarify that they are factually incorrect. It needs to be identified in the House and on the record that there are two very important components of that bill that have continued.

The first is that prior to passing Bill C-11, there was a backlog in this country of over 60,000 refugee claimants. The process set in place by Bill C-11 would see that reduced significantly. In fact, that has happened. The backlog has been reduced to below 45,000 refugee applicants, which is a very critical component to the direction Bill C-11 was moving toward, which is to ensure that we do not have a tremendous backlog that would put us in an extremely difficult position in terms of processing applications.

The second is a point which the minister brought up during his speech. With the implementation of Bill C-11, we would see an additional 2,500 refugees, which is 20% on top of the current average. An additional 2,500 refugees would be able to settle in our country. We would accept those additional 2,500. Five hundred would be government-sponsored refugees and 2,000 would be privately sponsored.

I know what the Liberal Party and NDP critics' jobs are, but to hear them say that Bill C-11 has not moved forward and has not helped refugees or those in need is completely false. I suggest that when they get the opportunity, they should acknowledge that they supported two parts of that bill without reserve, and those parts continue to move forward today.

Turning now to Bill C-31, Canada welcomes more refugees per capita than any other G20 country in the world. I mentioned the additional 2,500 refugees that will settle in this country. They will, through the United Nations and private sponsorship, begin to come to this country.

The facts speak for themselves. In 2011, Canada received a total of 5,800 refugee claims from people in democratic, rights-respecting member countries of the European Union. That is an increase of 14% from 2010. It means that 23% of the total refugee claims come from the EU. That is more than Africa and Asia. In fact, Hungary is the top source country for people attempting to claim refugee status in Canada. Hungary is an EU member state. That means 4,400 or 18% of all refugee claims in 2011 came from Hungary. That is up 50% from 2010.

What is even more telling is that in 2010, of the 2,400 claims made by Hungarian nationals, only 100 of them were made in countries outside Canada. That means Canada received 2,300 of those claims, 23 times more than any other country in the world. That is not by accident. Those claims are being made for a reason. What is most important is that virtually all of these claims are abandoned, withdrawn or rejected. Refugee claimants themselves are choosing not to see their claims to completion, meaning they are actually not in genuine need of Canada's protection. In other words, these claims are bogus. They are false. They are untrue. These bogus claims from the EU cost Canadian taxpayers over $170 million a year.

At the federal level, we throw figures around in millions of dollars on a regular basis. However, if the average cost of a refugee claim is $55,000 and upwards of only 38% of those claims are actually approved, we can see what we now accept and have to deal with. It costs $170 million to deal with bogus claims and claims that are withdrawn or abandoned. That money should not go to defend and try to articulate and determine whether these are actual refugees. It should go to refugees who are in fact approved and need the assistance, whether it be for settlement services, education or whatever it may be to help them acclimatize and learn about our Canadian system.

Bill C-31, the protecting Canada's immigration system act, is part of our plan to restore integrity to our asylum system. It would make Canada's refugee determination process faster, fairer, stronger and more appealing. It would ensure that we would go through this process in a faster way so that legitimate refugees would be able to settle into the country and be approved. As well, we would remove bogus claimants in a much quicker, more expedient way so that we could actually deliver services to those who deserve them.

The monetary aspect is not why we are moving forward with the legislation. However, with the implementation of Bill C-31, over the next five years, we will see a savings to taxpayers across the country of close to $1.65 billion.

Bill C-31 would also help speed up refugee claims in a number of ways. One major component is the improvements to the designated countries of origin provisions. It would enable the ministry to respond more quickly to increases in refugee claims from countries that generally did not produce refugees.

The minister and I spoke earlier of what we saw in the European Union. That is specifically why we will be able to ensure with a safe country that we can process and work through the response in a period of up to, and no more than, 45 days. That is compared to a process which now takes upward, and in many cases exceeds, 1,000 days. It goes on and on.

Much of the determination of which countries would be designated would be determined on criteria clearly outlined in both the legislation and within the ministerial order. For example, for a country to be considered relatively safe, more than 60% of its asylum claims are withdrawn or have been abandoned by the claimants themselves, or more than 75% of asylum claims are rejected by the independent Immigration and Refugee Board. If that is not an objective, neutral test, I am not sure how the opposition could actually come up with one.

Because there will be countries that do not have a threshold in terms of the numbers who come to our country and claim refugee status, where there are not enough of those claims to make an objective quantitative assessment, clear qualitative criteria will be applied to determine the likelihood that a country would produce genuine refugees. This criteria will include, for example, an independent judicial system that recognizes and respects democratic rights and freedoms and whether civil society organizations exist and operate in that country.

In fact, unlike the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which had both quantitative and qualitative criteria specified only in regulation, Bill C-31 would have its qualitative factors enshrined in legislation, while the quantitative factors would be set out in a ministerial order. In this way, the criteria used to trigger a country for review for designation would be more transparent and more accountable than under the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. It is an important criteria and important aspect to keep in mind as we debate the bill.

The designated country of origin provisions included in Bill C-31 would bring Canada in line with peer countries, like the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Switzerland, recognizing that some countries were safer than others.

The opposition likes to use the United Nations as an example, or at least as the leadership that we should follow in terms of how we recognize refugees and how we are supposed to stay in line with what should happen in dealing with refugees in our system, in our program in our country.

However, if I could just quote from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, who has himself acknowledged, “there are indeed Safe Countries of Origin and there are indeed countries in which there is a presumption that refugee claims will probably be not as strong as in other countries”. He also has agreed that as long all refugee claimants have access to some process, it is completely legitimate to accelerate claims from safe countries.

Under Bill C-31, every refugee claimant would continue to receive a hearing before the independent and quasi-judicial Immigration and Refugee Board regardless of where he or she may have come from. Furthermore, every refugee claimant in Canada would have access to at least one level of appeal. This is contrary to the opposition statements. These procedures exceed the requirements of both our domestic law and our international obligations.

Unfortunately, what is lost in a lot of the debate on the bill is the other equally important positive aspect that it will have. Not only will it result in fewer bogus claims abusing our generous immigration system, it will also allow for legitimate refugees who are in need of Canada's protection to receive that protection much sooner than they do now.

I want to stop at this point for a moment. Under Canada's current refugee determination system, it takes an average of two years before refugee claimants receive a decision on their case. Our system has become so backward that legitimate refugees are not in a position to move forward in a much quicker way. Our system has been overwhelmed by a backlog of cases. We have started to work toward a reduction of those cases, but we have not done enough and we need to do more, which is why we are debating Bill C-31.

It is important to remind the House and all Canadians that bogus refugee claims clog up our system. They result in legitimate refugees who are in genuine need of Canada's protection waiting far too long to receive that needed protection.

Bill C-31 would further deter abuse of Canada's immigration system by providing the government the authority to collect biometric data from certain foreign nationals who wanted to enter into Canada. The minister brought forward countless examples of serious criminals, human smugglers, war criminals and suspected terrorists, among others, who had come into this country in the past, sometimes repeatedly, up to eight times, even after having been deported. As fraudsters become more sophisticated, so too must the countries that are to protect their citizens. Therefore, biometrics will improve our ability to keep violent criminals and those who pose a threat to our country out.

Foreign criminals will now be barred entry into Canada thanks to biometrics. It is an important new tool that will help protect the safety and security of Canadians by reducing identity fraud and identity theft. Biometrics, in short, will strengthen the integrity of our system and help protect the safety and security of Canadians while helping facilitate legitimate travel.

Using biometrics will also bring Canada in line with other countries that are already ahead of us in that regard, the United Kingdom, Australia, European Union, New Zealand, United States and Japan, among others.

I would like to point out that while other countries around the world are using biometrics, opposition members voted against the use of biometrics and the funding to implement it, to assist with the safety of both Canadians and those entering our country. They determined they were not going to support what Canadians, if we were to ask them, probably believed should already have been implemented.

It is not likely surprising to anyone that I certainly do support the bill and that all of the government's efforts to improve our immigration system move us in the right direction.

However, what is telling about the bill is that a large number of experts and immigration stakeholders also support the bill. I heard from both critics, from the NDP and Liberals, that all lawyers across the country did not support the bill.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I will inform the member that it was actually a Liberal government that brought it in, but if the member for St. Catharines wants to try to take the credit for that, I will give him some credit.

What the government can take credit for is the huge backlog of refugees that has been generated. Remember that it was the Conservatives who did not fill the necessary positions at the refugee board to hear the numbers, and that is what started the backlog in the refugee system. Yes, improvement has been needed but members will find that through the years there has been movement, with a good mixture of immigrants and a progressive immigration policy that includes refugees.

We in the Liberal Party value the contributions that refugees make to our country. We have had refugees who have made it to Governor General of Canada, and to every economic, business, societal, non-profit and for-profit organization. Ninety-five percent plus of refugees who settle here in Canada go on to contribute immensely to our country and nation. We recognize that and are not scared to talk about it. The government and this minister in particular, on the other hand, have a totally different objective, an objective that demonizes the refugees in our great country.

The Liberal Party does not support Bill C-31, and for a good reason. Bill C-31 is in essence Bill C-4 and Bill C-11, with one major compromise in Bill C-11. The compromise took out the idea of an advisory group that would determine and advise the minister on which countries would be on the safe list. That was good enough when the Tories had a minority government but now that they have a majority government, they are going back to the Reform ways in how they are trying to deal with refugees in our country.

The minister wants to say what is a safe country. Think of the consequences of that. The minister wakes up one day and says that country X is no longer a safe country. As result, someone who comes from that country and claims to be a refugee will in all likelihood be gone before any sort of an appeal can be heard. That person will not even be in Canada but will have had to leave the country in order to make any sort of appeal.

The minister also wants to say who is an irregular arrival. That goes back to Bill C-4. There have been arguments about that. I know the minister will often write off the Liberal Party or the New Democrats as just being the opposition speaking. I would like to provide a specific quote about the government's behaviour on that particular line, and this comes from lawyers across our country.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is true that the Bloc did play an instrumental role in building Bill C-11 in the previous Parliament. It is only fair to point that out.

It does seem like the government is trying to target refugees. One of the problems with Bill C-4 is that although it is directed punitively at human smugglers, it actually penalizes the refugees. That is what everyone is pointing out.

What happens if a refugee comes here? We will lock them up. We will prevent them from sponsoring their family for five years. We will prevent them from making an appeal application for five years. That is not targeting the smugglers but the refugees.

That is the problem with this bill. This bill also prevents someone from making a humanitarian and compassionate claim for up to one year, and it forces someone who arrives on our shores to make an election within 15 days between whether they make a refugee claim or a humanitarian and compassionate claim. These are people who often cannot speak English and have no access to legal advice. This is another serious structural flaw in the bill.

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Madam Speaker, an exceptional thing happened, and I am sure the member who just spoke took part in it. It was in 2010, when we passed an amended version of Bill C-11. All the parties examined the issue and improved the government's bill. Even the minister was pleased, because he said that once the bill was amended, it was an essential tool for safeguarding the integrity of Canada's immigration and refugee systems. The bill, as amended by the Bloc Québécois and the other parties, had a provision to accelerate the application process. It also provided the right to appeal for all refugees, without exception. With Bill C-31, the government is removing all that.

I wonder if the government is trying to send a message to refugees the world over, telling them not to come to Canada, that they are not welcome. That is the feeling we get from Bill C-31. What does my colleague think?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to stand and debate this bill and present the position of the official opposition, the New Democratic Party of Canada, on Bill C-31, improperly and inaccurately named “protecting Canada's immigration system act”, because this bill would do damage to Canada's immigration system legally, socially, morally and internationally.

I want to talk about the omnibus nature of this bill which, just from a structural point of view, is something that is a disturbing feature of the Conservative government. Canadians saw already in this Parliament, the government take nine separate pieces of serious and complex crime legislation and put them into one omnibus bill and then put that before parliamentarians to discuss and debate. Now we see the minister take two separate major pieces of legislation, as well as another serious issue, which is that of biometrics, and combine those into one bill.

For Canadians who may be watching this, I want to explain a bit about what those bills are. By introducing this bill, the minister has taken Bill C-11, which was introduced in the last Parliament, debated, went through committee, was amended and passed in this very House, went through all three readings at the Senate committee and passed there, received royal assent and was waiting to be implemented this June, and the minister has stopped that bill from being implemented this June. I will tell members a bit more about what the minister had to say about that bill in a few moments. That bill was geared toward reforming Canada's refugee system.

About that bill, in June 2010 the minister said:

We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

These amendments, I am happy to say, create a reform package that is both faster and fairer than the bill as it was originally tabled.

Those were the comments by the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism on Tuesday, June 15, 2010. The minister has now taken the original bill that he had tabled in the previous Parliament, before those amendments that made it fairer and faster, and has thrown the amendments in the garbage and reintroduced the original bill, the very bill that he said was inferior to the amendments that were made by all parties of this House. The minister has, not unsurprisingly, neglected to explain that.

In addition, one of the first bills the Conservatives introduced in this Parliament was Bill C-4, again inaccurately and unconscionably titled a bill concerning human smuggling. It has been going through debate in this place but the minister has taken that bill and put it into this current Bill C-31. There is no explanation as to why he would take a bill, which has already been introduced and is moving through the system, slow it down and put it back into this legislative process, basically putting us behind where we would have been. I have a theory as to why that may be the case. Bill C-4 has been roundly condemned by virtually every group and stakeholder involved in the immigration system in this country, from lawyers, refugee groups, churches and immigrant settlement services across the board. I cannot name any group that has sent any message that it supports Bill C-4.

As well, the government has taken another issue, biometrics, and put that into the bill. What is puzzling about that is that approximately 30 days ago we commenced a study in the Standing Committee on Immigration and Citizenship on biometrics. We have had a handful of meetings and are in the middle of our study of biometrics and the government introduces legislative steps on the very thing we are supposed to be studying. I wonder what that says about the government's view of the work of standing committees and the experts and witnesses who appear before our committee when it actually comes to a conclusion before we have heard all the evidence.

I want to talk about the substance of Bill C-4. Bill C-4 was hastily drafted by the government when Canadians witnessed the spectre of two boats coming to the shores of British Columbia carrying some of the most damaged and wounded people on earth, people fleeing, as the minister has rightly pointed out, one of the worst civil wars in the world in Sri Lanka.

Some 550 people were on those boats. And, never ones to pass up a good photo op, the Minister of Immigration and the Minister of Public Safety were there doing news conferences outside accusing the people on those boats of being bogus and of harbouring terrorists. They said that publicly. They also accused them of queue jumping.

What anyone going through the immigration system knows up to now is that there is no queue jumping. It is a normal part of our refugee system for people to make their way to a country by regular means and make a refugee claim, and the Minister of Immigration knows that. No queue is being jumped. The Minister of Immigration actually went into immigrant communities where they were suffering long delays in their applications for permanent residency to sponsor their parents and preyed on their frustrations at his government's inability to deal with that backlog and wait time and tried to foster resentment from those immigrants toward these refugees.

We always want to be careful with our analogies but we need to consider the Jews when they were fleeing Nazi Germany during World War II. When they made their way into a neighbouring country through the dark of night, they did not arrive with a visa. They did not come through any UNHCR process because there was none at the time. They just made their way to safety. Those people were not bogus. They were not jumping any queue. They were escaping for their lives. That is what people do and that is what those people were doing on those boats.

To make the claim that those people were terrorists before there was an adjudication is as incendiary and as inflammatory as it is wrong. To this day, of 540 people, none have been deemed to be terrorists. Also, if anyone has any kind of question about their origin, there are less than a handful.

What would Bill C-4 do? It would allow the minister to concentrate his power. The Minister of Immigration wants the power to designate people as irregular arrivals. Under the bill, it just says a group. It does not define how many. We presume it is two or more. What happens to those people? Those people could be detained for up to a year without review.

I will talk about the legality of that. The identical provision has gone to the Supreme Court of Canada in the security certificate cases and it has been deemed unconstitutional, yet the government puts it right back into this bill. Moreover, the minister says that they can come out if they are deemed to be refugees. That is true but that assumes that we have a refugee determination system that would make that determination in under a year. If it does not, people could be stuck in detention for up to a year. Even if those people are deemed to be bona fide refugees, this part of the bill would still prevent those people from being able to make a permanent residency application for five years or sponsor their family for five years. I will say right now that that is a violation of the UN convention on refugees and a violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

I will explain for the minister why that is the case. I put the question to him and he avoided answering the question. It is because the UN convention on refugees says that signatories, which Canada is, are not to put penalties on people who arrive at our shores by irregular means. If people who are deemed to be refugees are then prevented from sponsoring their families for five years or prohibited from making a permanent residency application for five years, they are absolutely being penalized because of their irregular entry.

The minister said that if they make a successful refugee claim they would be let out within the year. That is true but what about the five year bans? The minister refuses to answer that. That is the differential treatment of someone who comes through in the other process and it is a violation of the UN convention on refugees.

In terms of the rights of the child, the Ocean Lady and the Sun Sea, the two boats came to Canada's shores, included children who were travelling unaccompanied. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child obligates signatories, of which Canada is one, to put the best interests of the child first and foremost in our determination, and that includes in the immigration system. If we have a 14-year-old or a 12-year-old child who comes to our country and is deemed by the minister to be an irregular arrival, he or she would be prohibited from sponsoring his or her parents for five years. That is not in the best interests of that child. I say that there is a violation there.

Lawyers across the country from the Canadian Bar Association to the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers have all said that the detention without review process will be attacked as a violation of the charter in three different ways. The act will go to the Supreme Court of Canada, mark my words.

Let us talk about the Bill C-11 component. All parties in the House in the last Parliament worked in good faith to reform Canada's refugee system. I will grant the minister that there was need for reform. The minister is correct when he says that the old system is not working. People make a refugee claim, they are denied, they appeal. Then they make a H and C application and they are denied the appeal. Then they make a pre-removal assessment application and they are denied the appeal. It can take too long to remove people who do not have valid claims.

That is why the parties rolled up our sleeves last Parliament and worked on a streamlined quick process to make those determinations. The New Democrats proposed, as we have for a long time, through our hard work, that the government actually put in place a Refugee Appeal Division, which I will give the minister credit for doing. The Liberals never did do it and the current minister did. However, it was pushed by the New Democrats all the way.

The problem with the bill is that the minister then wanted to deny access to the appeal division of people that he determined to come from so-called safe countries. The minister wanted the sole power to determine what was a safe country. Again, that is too much power concentrated in the hands of one person. The opposition asked why he did not have an independent panel of experts to guide him with firm criteria and the minister accepted that change. In fact, he praised it. He said that it made the process of designation more transparent. Those are not my words, they are the minister's words in the last Parliament. Now today, the minister has thrown that panel out and he wants to go back to the original proposals so that he alone determines what is a safe country.

As well, the minister wanted to deny access to the appeal division to people who came from what he deemed to be safe countries. In the last Parliament, we persuaded the minister and we said that everyone had a right to appeal. We cannot have a justice system where some people have a right to appeal and some do not. Imagine how Canadians would feel if we said that if they went to court, their neighbour could appeal the decision, but they could not, depending on where they came from. We were successful in saying that everyone had a right to appeal no matter where they came from.

While I am on this subject, a fundamental difference between the Conservatives and the New Democrats is that New Democrats believe that every country in this world is capable of producing a refugee. There are cases where some countries or more or less likely, but every country is capable of that. In particular, on the LGBT community, 100 countries have some form of legal discrimination against the LGBT community. Governments change.

The minister said that there were EU countries that had refugees and they had to be safe. Right now the far-right government of Hungary is currently passing laws before its parliament to have the power to pass laws in 24 hours, with 6 minutes of debate accorded to the opposition parties. It is amending the constitution. There is the situation of the Roma in Europe. Everyone knows in World War II that Jews were rounded up because of their faith and ethnicity. Roma were rounded up because of their ethnicity as were disabled and communists. These were historically discriminated against, including Roma. There is a long history of established discrimination against Roma, and those people come from Hungary. They come from the Czech Republic, from Romania, from countries that are members of the EU in some cases and those people have a right to make their claim.

The minister has thrown out the panel of experts to advise him. I ask why? If the minister is so confident that he can choose which countries are safe countries, why would he not want the benefit of advice from experts in human rights, the very idea he praised and thought was a good idea 18 months ago?

The Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism may have great faith in his own judgment, but to have one person make such important determinations as to what country is safe or not, which country is or is not capable of producing refugees and who is an irregular arrival who will be subject to detention for up to a year without review and penalties that might keep their families apart for a decade. That is too much power for one person. We should build in checks and balances and that would be the case no matter who would be the minister of immigration, including a New Democrat. I do not know who would make the argument that the system is not better served by having that kind of check and balance.

In terms of the biometrics, biometrics is a system whereby this legislation would have people who apply for a visa to come to this country provide their fingerprints and pictures. That is a model we should be looking at, but there are significant privacy considerations and the Standing Committee on Immigration is looking at those very considerations right now.

The privacy commissioner has already testified and she says that providing a fingerprint for the purposes of identification to ensure that people presenting at our borders are who they say they are is fine. However, taking that fingerprint and comparing it to a wide database for other purposes or sharing that information with other countries or other bodies raises serious privacy concerns. We are in the middle of looking at those and those are issues that the government would be well advised to pay attention to before we proceed down that path.

I want to talk about a few other things that the bill would do.

The bill would prevent someone who has been convicted of a jail sentence of more than 10 years from making a refugee claim. I have raised this issue as well. Nelson Mandela was convicted of a crime for which he received a sentence of more than 10 years. Under the legislation, were that to happen today, Nelson Mandela could not make a refugee claim in Canada. He might be able to make a humanitarian and compassionate claim but no refugee claim. I have not heard the government explain that.

The bill would also, for the first time, give the minister the power to refer to the IRB the case of a refugee who had now become a permanent resident. The minister would have the power to strip that refugee of his or her permanent resident status if it were determined that circumstances had changed in the country from which the refugee escaped. That is unacceptable. People come to this country seeking safety and yet they find themselves, under this legislation, perhaps looking at being stripped of that status.

I would like to move the following amendment. I move:

That the motion be amended by deleting all of the words after the word “That” and substituting the following:

this House declines to give second reading to Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, the Marine Transportation Security Act and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Act, because it:

(a) places an unacceptable level of arbitrary power in the hands of the minister;

(b) allows for the indiscriminate designation and subsequent imprisonment of bona fide refugees for up to one year without review;

(c) places the status of thousands of refugees and permanent residents in jeopardy;

(d) punishes bona fide refugees, including children, by imposing penalties based on mode of entry to Canada;

(e) creates a two-tiered refugee system that denies many applicants access to an appeals mechanism; and

(f) violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and two international conventions to which Canada is signatory.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

moved that Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, the Marine Transportation Security Act and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to begin debate on Bill C-31, an act to protect Canada's immigration system.

Canada has a proud tradition as a welcoming country. For generations, for centuries, we have welcomed newcomers from all parts of the globe.

For more than four centuries, we have welcomed new arrivals, economic immigrants, pioneers, farmers, workers and, of course, refugees needing our protection. We have a humanitarian tradition that we are very proud of. During the 19th century, Canada was the North Star for slaves fleeing the United States. We accepted tens of thousands of black Americans and offered them freedom and protection.

Throughout the 20th century, we welcomed more than one million refugees, including those who fled communist governments, like the people of Hungary in 1956, when we welcomed 50,000 Hungarian nationals. In 1979, we accepted 60,000 Vietnamese nationals, refugees who were fleeing that decade's communism. We are very proud of our tradition. With this bill, this government is going to reinforce and enhance our tradition of protecting refugees.

I am pleased to say that our government is increasing by some 20% the number of resettled refugees, UN convention refugees who are living in camps in deplorable circumstances around the world. We will now accept them and give them a new life and a new beginning here in Canada. We are also increasing by some 20% the refugee assistance program to assist with the initial integration costs of government assisted refugees who arrive here.

We continue to maintain the most generous and open immigration program in the world since our government came to office, welcoming more than a quarter of a million new permanent residents each year, the highest sustained level of immigration in Canadian history, adding 0.8% of our population per year through immigration, representing the highest per capita level of immigration in the developed world.

However, for us to maintain this openness, this generosity toward newcomers, both economic immigrants and refugees, we must demonstrate that our immigration and refugee programs are characterized by fair rules and their consistent application.

Canadians are a generous and open-minded people but they also believe in fair play. Canadians insist, particularly new Canadians, that those who seek to enter Canada do so in a way that is fully respectful of our fair and balanced immigration and refugee laws.

That is why Canadians are worried when they see large human smuggling operations, for example, the two large ships that arrived on Canada's west coast in the past two years with hundreds of passengers, illegal migrants who paid criminal networks to be brought to Canada in an illegal and very dangerous manner.

Canadians are also worried when they see a large number of false refugee claimants who do not need Canada's protection, but who file refugee claims because they see an opportunity in Canada's current refugee system to stay in Canada permanently and have access to social benefits even though they are not really refugees in need of our country's protection.

Canadians want Parliament and this government to take strong and meaningful action to reinforce the integrity and fairness of our immigration and refugee systems, which is why we tabled Bill C-31.

The bill has three principal elements: First, it includes essentially all of the provisions of the bill currently on the order paper known as Bill C-11, a bill designed to combat human smugglers from targeting Canada and treating this country like a doormat; second, it includes important revisions and improvements to our asylum system to ensure that we grant fast protection to bona fide refugees who need Canada's assistance, but that we remove from Canada false asylum claimants who seek to abuse our generosity; and third, it would provide for the legislative authorities for the creation of a new biometric temporary resident visa program which would be the single-most important advance in immigration security screening and the integrity of our system in decades.

With regard to the first question, as I was saying, the destination for major voyages organized by criminal networks in Southeast Asia and human smugglers was Canada. Only two major voyages have reached Canada in the past two years. Thanks to the efforts of our intelligence and policing agencies and the co-operation of the countries of transit of the illegal migrants from Southeast Asia, we managed to prevent a number of other human smuggling voyages from reaching Canada.

Thanks to the strong investigatory police and intelligence operations of our agencies in Southeast Asia and in West Africa, we have succeeded in preventing several large planned voyages of illegal smuggled migrants to Canada. I know some members of the opposition categorize these as humanitarian missions of hapless refugees but we need to be clear on what we are talking about. The networks targeting Canada were typically gunrunners running illegal armaments and weapons into the Sri Lankan civil war. They were profiteering from one of the deadliest civil wars around the world in recent decades. When the war ended, they needed a new commodity to move so they took on people. Every year around the world, thousands of people die in dangerous illegal human smuggling operations, whether they are marine migrants off the coasts of Australia, or people being smuggled in cargo containers who suffocate to death as they cross the British Channel, or people who are dying while trying to cross the Mexico–U.S. border under the guidance of coyotes of illegal smugglers.

Every year, thousands of people die as a result of human smuggling networks. We therefore have a legal and moral obligation to put an end to these dangerous human smuggling operations and prevent the deaths that occur each year.

I do not want to be the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism on whose watch we have a large vessel of illegal smuggled migrants headed to Canada in a leaky vessel that goes down in the Pacific Ocean at the great cost of human life if we have not done everything within our power to prevent human smugglers from targeting this country.

The anti-smuggling provisions of Bill C-31, which were previously included in Bill C-11, would give us additional tools to combat the smugglers. First, it would impose stronger penalties, both in financial fines and prison sentences, on the shipowners and the smugglers, although, admittedly, it is very hard to prosecute the smugglers because they typically operate offshore.

Second, the bill would enhance detention provisions for smuggled migrants who arrive in an operation that would be designated by the Minister of Public Safety as a designated irregular arrival or smuggling event. This is because when hundreds of people arrive in such an operation without documents, without visas, having arrived illegally in violation of several immigration and marine laws or other statutes, we need the time to be able to identify who they are. We need to know whether they are admissible to Canada and whether they constitute a security risk to our country. We cannot practically do that for a large number of smuggled migrants overnight.

We have to be able to keep illegal immigrants in custody, in a completely humanitarian way, so that they can be identified. However, let us be clear: Bill C-31 continues to give migrants, even illegal and smuggled migrants, the right to file a claim for refugee protection with the Immigration and Refugee Board. We will therefore not refuse anyone access to our asylum system, even in cases where people arrive in the country in illegal ways.

The bill proposes humanely detaining migrants who arrive through illegal smuggling operations for up to 12 months without review.

That again would allow our intelligence agencies to do the necessary background checks on such individuals.

I should mention that these provisions are far more modest than those used in most other liberal democratic countries like Australia, New Zealand, the United States, the United Kingdom and most European countries.

Finally, we would disincentivize illegal migrants from paying often tens of thousands of dollars to criminal gangs in order to be smuggled to Canada by indicating that even if they get a positive protection decision at the IRB, if they arrived in a designated irregular smuggling event, they would not receive permanent residency for at least five years. They would receive protection. They would not be refouled to their country of origin. We would be fully respectful of our legal and moral obligations under the United Nations universal conventions on refugees and torture, as well as our obligations under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, as defined by the Supreme Court of Canada in the Singh decision and other jurisprudence.

We would fully respect our absolute obligation of non-refoulement of people deemed to be facing risk to their lives or persecution in their country of origin, but we are not obliged to give immediate permanent residency to such individuals. With immediate permanent residency comes the privilege, not the absolute right but the privilege, of sponsorship of family members. The reason is that many smuggled migrants, we know from our intelligence, calculate that they will be able to pay the $40,000 or $50,000 obligation that they have made to the smuggling network by sponsoring subsequent family members to help them pay off the debt. We need to create some doubt in the minds of would-be smuggled migrants that they would be able to benefit from such provisions as family reunification. That is what the bill seeks to do.

Second, let us look at the changes to the asylum system proposed in the bill.

I would first like to remind the hon. members that, in June 2010, this House approved important and balanced reforms to the asylum system in order to make it fair and effective, but the current system is broken. It is not working. It takes almost two years for refugee claimants to get a hearing before the IRB. That means the real victims of persecution must wait almost two years to be certain that they have Canada's protection. That is unacceptable.

However, we are seeing an increasing number of false claims for refugee protection in the system. More specifically, since the bill on balanced reforms to the asylum system passed in 2010, there has been rising tide of false asylum claims filed by nationals from countries that are completely democratic, liberal and respectful of human rights. I am speaking specifically about countries in the European Union. Frankly, I find it a bit strange that we are receiving more refugee claims from the European Union than from Asia or Africa. It does not make any sense.

Last year, we received 5,400 refugee claims from European nationals, almost none of whom attended their hearings before the Immigration and Refugee Board. That means that almost all European claimants abandon or withdraw their own refugee claims.

Virtually all of these European asylum claimants are abandoning or withdrawing their own asylum claims. They are not even showing up for the hearing. However, what almost every single one of them does show up for is the initial interview that is required to get the status document as an asylum claimant which qualifies them for an open work permit, full interim federal health care benefits, which are better than the health benefits available to most Canadians, provincial welfare payments, and several federal cash grants for programs.

We stand for the protection of real refugees. We stand against the abuse of Canada's generosity. That is why these measures are necessary. They take a balanced approach. I regret to see members of the opposition turn a blind eye to what is widespread abuse of the system. That is not my opinion. That is a reflection of the fact that in too many cases the applicants do not show up for their hearings, but they do show up to collect Canadian social benefits.

What we seek to do is strengthen the reforms adopted in 2010 by allowing the minister to more quickly designate certain countries which are known not normally to produce refugees, which countries would see an abandonment rate at the IRB of 60% or more, or a rejection rate by the IRB of cases heard of 75% or more, and/or which countries are respectful of human rights and are signatories to the UN convention on refugees, which have an independent judiciary and allow independent NGOs to operate. These are the kinds of countries we are talking about. Claimants from those countries would receive a hearing at the IRB in a delay of about 45 days and that is it. They would receive no further appeals.

Under the current system, with the redundant administrative appeals and post-claim recourses, a manifestly unfounded asylum claimant is able to stay in Canada often for up to five or six years or longer and claim benefits that whole period of time. This is a positive incentive for false claimants to abuse and clog up our system, while delaying protection for the bona fide refugees who do need our protection.

I reiterate that the bill would also create the new refugee appeal division. The vast majority of claimants who are coming from countries that do normally produce refugees would for the first time, if rejected at the refugee protection division, have access to a full fact-based appeal at the refugee appeal division of the IRB. This is the first government to have created a full fact-based appeal.

I find it ironic to hear members of the opposition complain that this government is insufficiently concerned about the procedural rights of refugees when the Liberals in particular refused to create the refugee appeal division. We are putting it in place because we want to ensure that real refugees get Canada's protection. That is why we are actually strengthening this dimension of the system.

Finally, the bill includes legislative authorities to allow the government to require foreign nationals to submit biometric data, particularly fingerprints and a digital quality photo, when applying for a temporary resident visa. In doing so, we would be adopting the same approach as Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, and increasingly the European Union to harness new technology to facilitate the movement of legitimate visitors, travellers, business people and students to Canada, yet we would be able to better detect those who intend to do this country harm. I have a long list of criminals who have come back to Canada, some as many as 10 times, on fake documents and fake passports. One was deported eight times on more than 30 counts, including theft and fraud, and kept coming back to Canada on fake documents. With biometric visas, that would no longer be possible.

I hope this bill will lead to serious consideration of these important measures to protect our proud humanitarian tradition of refugee protection and our large and open immigration system, but also to maintain the integrity and fairness of that system. That is something we owe all Canadians and new Canadians now and in the future.

Bill C-11—Time Allocation Motion

[Christian Paradis, Conservative, Minister of Industry and Minister of State (Agriculture)]

Mr. Speaker, first, we are all well aware that the NDP's strategy is to block virtually all bills. That is what the member for Acadie—Bathurst said. He revealed a plan to impede the progress of all bills by putting forward as many speakers as possible to justify a strategy in which members have the right to speak.

As my colleague, the Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages, pointed out, many speeches have been given during the current session. During the last session of the previous Parliament, there were, once again, 17 speeches with a range of exchanges concerning bills C-32 and C-11. Before that, there had already been 27 hours of debate.

That is why we are saying it is now time to pass the bill as is. We will accept amendments in committee, but it is time to leave vinyl and VHS behind and move into the digital age. We have to move on without further delay. To do otherwise would be to let the nation get bogged down in yet another political impasse and fail to fulfill our international obligations according to the World Intellectual Property Organization.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

In terms of a couple of things that we accomplished in the last Parliament, number one, the passage of Bill C-11, the refugee reform act, and number two, Bill C-35, the Crooked Consultants Act, could you provide the committee with a brief update on both of those pieces of legislation, not so much obviously from a government perspective on the bill itself, but rather on the implementation of them both? They both bring sweeping changes to their respective departments and obviously will lead to some fairly significant changes within your departments. Would you mind updating us on the status of both pieces of legislation in terms of practicality?

Safe Streets and Communities Act

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I understand the point the member is making. I compliment him on his appointment as critic for the third party at our citizenship, immigration and multiculturalism committee. I look forward to working with him on that committee.

The member understands. He was here for part of the 40th Parliament when we introduced and passed Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act and Bill C-35, the crooked consultants act, two pieces of significant legislation. In fact, I would argue that, aside from our budget, Bill C-11 was the most significant piece of legislation that this Parliament passed in the 40th Parliament. That legislation arrived in this House after second reading, went to committee, came back for third reading and was passed unanimously by the House.

I can let the member know that we have lots in this bill that we want to pass. We have passed quite a bit with respect to citizenship and immigration. There is a lot more to come.

Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I want to correct the record. I appreciate the fact that the member is making his presentation and speech on how he feels about Bill C-4 but he does need to ensure he is delivering what is factually in the bill.

He indicated that it would create two streams of refugees. In fact, that is not the case. The individuals who are on these ships are not refugees. They are not refugees until they have actually gone through the process and have either qualified or not qualified through the process. Therefore, in no way, shape or form are there two sets of refugees based on the bill. It is a very factual bill and the member needs to ensure he is correct on it.

I do want to ask him one question. He indicated that the government was not prepared to listen in the 40th Parliament with respect to the bill. I would say to him that if he looks at Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, and looks at Bill C-35, the crooked consultant act, he will find that we listened to all the parties on the opposite side of the House and came back to the House with both those bills passed unanimously.

Why will he not try to help us get the bill passed at second reading and get it into committee so we can talk about it?

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague on a very good speech. I have a couple of questions.

First, the government brought in Bill C-11 about a year and a half ago. The features of that legislation have not yet been fully implemented. The point of that legislation was to reduce the refugee backlog. I would ask the member why he thinks the government is not waiting to see if it is successful before introducing this bill.

Second, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism said in the House that there are people overseas who believe that if they come to Canada as refugees they will get a monthly income forever. That is obviously false. It is a misconception.

In a world where no information is perfect, I would ask the member what he thinks leads the minister to believe that these people who misinterpret or get false information will actually understand the provisions of the bill. They will certainly not hear about the tough new rules from the smugglers. How will these people know about these tough new provisions?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Madam Speaker, I can absolutely go through a host of issues, resolutions and legislation that we have passed in the House of Commons that deal exactly with what the member is speaking to.

I would suggest to him that there is a third way for us to work through these issues, and that is in consultation with each other. We did it with Bill C-11, the refugee reform act, and we did it with Bill C-35, the crooked consultants act. In the last Parliament, with a minority government, these two major pieces of legislation went through with unanimous consent from all parties. I suggest to him that the third way to do that is for us to sit down and continue to work together, to work in committee to bring these issues together, and we will work as a government to try to solve them.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as I was saying, this bill is illegal, is ineffective and fundamentally is ideologically driven.

Why is this bill illegal? Under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms we have the right not to be arbitrarily detained or imprisoned. In a Supreme Court judgment that came down a few years ago, 120 days was put as the outside limit beyond which someone could not be imprisoned without recourse to justice. This bill proposes one year as a mandatory detention. Whether or not the Conservatives like it, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms applies to everyone on Canadian territory, not just Canadian citizens.

This bill is also in violation of our United Nations obligations as a signatory to the UN convention on refugees, which demands that countries that are signatories to the convention on refugees expedite the integration of refugees into citizenship and life within those countries as much as possible.

To stipulate an arbitrary limit of five years before someone can seek permanent residency is in direct violation of both the spirit and letter of our responsibilities under the UN convention.

This bill will not pass legal muster. If it does not pass that, the question then becomes, what does it try to do? The Conservatives have made a lot of hay about how this would be a deterrent. It will prevent vulnerable people from taking the risks that we all recognize are associated with travelling across the oceans on leaky ships.

The problem with that thought process is that the deterrents we are proposing, a potential year of imprisonment or five years without permanent residency, are enough of a disincentive to deter legitimate refugees from coming over.

I remind the House that to be considered a legitimate refugee, the person must be fleeing from a state or country that offers no protection from persecution, torture and death. The refugee and his or her family must be in danger of their very lives and existence with no community or infrastructure to protect them from death or torture.

Refugees are willing to risk spending a little more time in prison in Canada where they will not be persecuted, killed or tortured. As well, although it is against Canadian law and principles, the possibility that they may not be able to bring their families over for five years is not a particularly powerful disincentive.

The bill does not work. It will not prevent people who are legitimate refugees from taking risks to come to Canada.

On the other side of the equation, imposing mandatory minimums of 10 years and harsher penalties on the smugglers who already face life imprisonment and millions of dollars in fines will not make a big difference to what is a multi-billion dollar industry.

If the bill is illegal and ineffective, the issue then becomes why is it in place and why is it being brought forward?

The minister likes to speak of Tamil refugee claimants living in the south of India who have heard they can get a monthly income in Canada and think it is wonderful.

The fact is this bill does not apply to economic migrants. If refugees come here trying to improve their lot in life they are not considered to be refugees. There is an evaluation process and they will be returned home. They do not get to jump any immigration queue by using the refugee process.

Perhaps it will deter economic migrants from boarding leaky ships to cross the ocean. That is fine, but we already have a process. A couple of years ago all parties agreed to pass Bill C-11 to improve the way we process refugees and expedite the return of failed refugee claimants. That is a much more effective deterrent.

What this bill does is punish people who, because they are recognized as actual refugees, are by definition among the most vulnerable people on the planet.

So why do we have a bill that is both illegal and ineffective? It is about ideology. It is about torquing up anti-immigration sentiment. It is about making people feel, every time the term “queue jumpers” is used, that the reason a family of new Canadians cannot sponsor a husband or wife or parents to come over in less than 10 or 12 years these days is that there are ships of queue jumpers showing up. That is a clever and insidious piece of misinformation the government is putting out.

There is no queue for refugees. We have a refugee process. Everyone who arrives here, whether by ship, bicycle, plane or somehow by sneaking across the border, gets evaluated within a process. The idea that the process of evaluation of 500 migrants who have arrived in two ships over the past few years is somehow bogging down our entire system overlooks the fact that we accepted 280,000 immigrants through our immigration process last year. Every year we accept about 250,000 to 260,000 immigrants on average. Every year we accept somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000 refugees. There is an order of magnitude of difference between those two numbers. So to say we are bogging down our system with these boats coming here and getting in our way and costing us lots of money is disingenuous to say the least, but dangerous to the sense of what Canada is and what it is around the world.

We are a country that has made mistakes in the past, in turning around ships like the St. Louis and the Komagata Maru. We are a country that has made mistakes by bowing to popular opinion and interring Japanese Canadian citizens and Italians and others in World War II.

We are supposed to have learned from our processes and errors. We are supposed to be able to say that we will not do this again, that we will not make these mistakes. Yet this piece of legislation falls into demagogic pandering to people's fears of refugees and others, and is actually a denial of the kind of Canada that we have fought to build over decades and generations.

Canada is a country governed by law and justice, seeking to be a safe haven of possibilities for everyone around the globe. As soon as we start closing our doors and turning our backs on the world's most vulnerable people, this is no longer the Canada we all believe in.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to rise in support of Bill C-4, a bill which would prevent human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system.

Human smuggling is a nefarious industry, one that exists around the world. Unfortunately, thousands of people die each year because of illegal migration and the smugglers who facilitate this migration.

Parliament needs to take action to put an end to the activities of human smugglers who have chosen Canada as a destination for their business, which is the dreadful exploitation of human beings.

Every year thousands of people around the world die in illegal smuggling operations organized by human smugglers. These people are not humanitarians. They do not assist people to become bona fide refugees and protect them from persecution. They are profiteers.

In the particular context with which we are dealing, namely those smuggling syndicates that are targeting Canada and which managed to bring two large shiploads of illegal migrants to our west coast in the past two years, our intelligence agencies and security and police partners in Southeast Asia all told us that these syndicates of human smugglers are essentially the gunrunners, the smugglers who helped to fuel the civil war in Sri Lanka by illicitly bringing contraband arms, bombs and guns into a theatre of conflict leading to the death of tens of thousands of innocent civilians. Since the end of the hostilities in Sri Lanka, these smuggling syndicates have been looking for a new business model, and instead of moving guns and bombs, they have switched to moving people for a very high price.

We know that those who have enlisted these smuggling syndicates to try to come illegally to Canada in violation of our immigration laws, in violation of our marine laws, in violation of international law, in violation of every principle of safe migration, have been willing to commit to pay up to $50,000 to the illegal smuggling syndicates. Typically, they pay about 10% of the fixed price as a down payment. A typical down payment to the smuggling syndicate is in the range of $5,000. The balance is typically payable over the course of time after arrival in Canada and very often through coerced participation in criminal activity.

As I mentioned, every year around the world thousands of people die in smuggling operations, whether they were migrants who suffocated in shipping containers crossing the English Channel or whether they were people who paid smugglers to go to Australia in dangerous shipping boats that crashed up against the shore.

We must act to send a very clear message that Canada is the most open developed country in the world to immigration, to newcomers, to refugees who need our protection and seek new opportunities. In order to maintain that remarkable openness, which by the way represents in Canada the highest level of immigration per capita in the developed world wherein we add .8% of our population per year through legal immigrants, and the highest level of refugee resettlement in the developed world through the 20% increase in our targets for refugee resettlement, by next year we will be accepting some 14,000 resettled refugees. Last year we welcomed 280,000 new permanent residents and we are increasing our program for refugee resettlement.

In order to maintain that generosity, that openness, and the public support which is necessary to maintain that attitude of openness, we must demonstrate to Canadians that our system is characterized by fairness and the rule of law.

One of the reasons that Canadians are so understandably upset when they see large scale smuggling operations is that it violates their sense of fairness and their belief that our immigration system is characterized by the application of fair rules.

Millions of people have come to Canada through our fair and generous immigration or refugee resettlement programs. In my experience they are those who most profoundly resent those who would pay illegal criminal networks to be smuggled to Canada illegally, avoiding the legal system.

My friend opposite and others have said that there is no so-called queue for refugees. First, I do not know how he knows that all or most of those who pay smuggling syndicates are refugees. We constantly hear from the critics that when we talk about our efforts to stop smugglers from targeting Canada we are talking about refugees. How do they know that? We know that many of the people in the two vessels who came to Canada most recently were coming from India transiting through Thailand, both democracies, both with the rule of law and protection for human rights. Perhaps colleagues opposite did not see the CBC report from Chennai in Tamil Nadu in India. Tamil Nadu is a region of southeastern India where tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, of Sri Lankan Tamils migrated during the conflict in Sri Lanka, where they sought temporary protection or new opportunities.

The CBC interviewed a group of several young Sri Lankan Tamil migrants in Tamil Nadu, India who said they had made down payments of up to $5,000 to these syndicates to be transported to Canada. They were not in a war zone. They were not subject to persecution. They said they wanted to come to Canada because they had heard about our “free monthly salaries”. We have to be very careful. We cannot and should not prejudge newly arrived migrants as to their prospective refugee claims. Some may be refugees; some may not. Many may just be seeking economic opportunity and heard that Canada is a soft target and therefore they are willing to pay smuggling syndicates.

What this bill seeks to do is maintain Canada's commitment to our domestic and international legal obligations with respect to refugee protection and to respect our humanitarian obligation to protect bona fide refugees fleeing persecution while at the same time changing the business model of the criminal smuggling syndicates. That is the objective of this bill.

We seek, first, to increase in the bill penalties for smugglers so that there will be a mandatory minimum prison sentence of 10 years for those who are found to participate in a human smuggling event which involves at least 50 individuals or in which there are exacerbating circumstances such as loss of life. We also massively increase the monetary fines for the owners of ships involved in these voyages. It is typically ships, but I should point out that the bill could address non-marine human smuggling events which have occurred in Canada.

That is an important message, but let us be realistic. I have studied this issue very closely. In fact, just last month I was in New Zealand and Bangkok, Thailand meeting with international partners and our own security agencies, as well as international police forces. I was trying to get a better understanding of the nature of these smuggling enterprises. It is very clear that we cannot impose Canadian law in terms of these sanctions on smugglers who operate overseas. The kingpins of these syndicates very rarely come to Canada. They are most typically jumping around between transit countries in Southeast Asia beyond our legal reach.

Having said that, there is an important dimension of our fight against human smuggling which is not formally in the legislation. It is an operational dimension whereby our government, through the good leadership of my colleague, the hon. Minister of Public Safety and the security and police agencies under his ministry, have dispatched additional resources for investigation and co-operation with the governments, police and intelligence agencies in the transit countries. Thanks to the additional resources that we have put into the region, we have managed successfully to prevent any of the planned voyages that were to target Canada. We know, without getting into operational or confidential details, that several voyages were planned for Canada that have been successfully interrupted, thanks in part to the co-operation of Canadian security forces in the region.

Having said that, let us be clear. In any black market there will always be someone willing to provide the contraband good or service if there is sufficient demand at a sufficiently high price point, because we are talking about profiteers. If they are able to get commitments of up to $50,000 to come to Canada, they will continue to try to find the vessels and put together the complex logistics to bring people from Southeast Asia to Canada. Therefore, in this legislation we must reduce the price point that people are willing to pay to be illegally smuggled to Canada through these criminal syndicates. That is the objective of the bill.

I think some opposition members have not studied the issue in all of its subtlety, or perhaps they do not understand how we are trying to disincentivize people from being willing to pay up to $50,000 to the smuggling syndicates. That is what the bill seeks to do.

For example, by reducing some of the privileges that normally exist for asylum claimants in Canada, should someone who has arrived in a designated smuggling event under this bill be found by our legal system to be a bona fide refugee in need of our protection, we will not send them back to their country of origin. We will therefore respect and conform with our international and domestic legal obligations. However, there is no obligation on Canada to grant such persons immediate permanent residency, which is normally the case for successful asylum claimants.

What the bill would do would be to say that we would grant people who are deemed to be bona fide refugees who have arrived in a designated smuggling event a temporary residency status in Canada for up to five years, after which we would then reassess the conditions in their country of origin to determine whether the country conditions have improved and whether the risk that was determined at their refugee hearing still continues.

If at that point there is a determination that conditions have improved significantly in that country, that they would no longer face risk if removed, they could then face removal back to their country of origin. However, should conditions in that country not have improved after five years, they would then have access to permanent residency in Canada as a further reflection of our humanitarian instinct.

During those initial five years, here is the key disincentive. Such individuals would not be entitled to the privilege of sponsoring family members to Canada because here is the key aspect of the bill. We know that people are prepared to commit to up to $50,000 based on a calculation that they subsequently will be able to sponsor family members, so the $50,000 price point is really not associated with just the migration of one individual, the smuggled individual, but indeed all subsequent family members who may follow that successful claimant. There is a commercial calculation being made here that the $40,000 to $50,000 price point may lead to permanent residency for the primary migrant and then subsequently permanent residency for members of the family who in turn could help to pay off the debt to the smuggling syndicate.

In the bill we are seeking to create a doubt, a question mark in the minds of those who constitute the market for the smuggling gangs. Will they be able to get permanent residency in Canada? That would no longer be a certainty. Will they be able to sponsor family members and help pay off the debt? It would no longer be a certainty. We are very strongly persuaded that this is a balanced approach.

Thirteen months ago, when the last large vessel arrived off the west coast with some 500 illegal migrants, Canadians were understandably disturbed with this large scale violation of the integrity of our immigration law and with this mass human smuggling voyage. At that time public opinion polls consistently said that about two-thirds of Canadians thought the government should prevent such vessels from even entering Canadian territorial waters. About 55% of Canadians, and an even higher percentage of new Canadians, immigrants to this country, said that if people who arrive in such a vessel get access to our refugee system and are deemed to be bona fide refugees, they should be immediately returned. That is what the majority of Canadians said.

As a government, we do not believe that approach would respect our legal or humanitarian obligations. Let me be clear. Contrary to some of the demagoguery we hear from critics of the bill, we would continue, notwithstanding that public opinion environment, to allow illegally smuggled migrants who file the refugee claim access to our asylum system, which is the fairest asylum system in the world, bar none. They would continue to have access to that system. We would not send back a single person who is deemed by our legal system likely to face danger of persecution or risk to their lives in their country of origin.

This bill exceeds our international and domestic legal obligations with respect to non-refoulement of refugees. The opposition says that this is like refusing to allow Jewish refugees to come here during the second world war. Nonsense. This approach would allow any refugee, or even a false refugee claimant, access to our asylum system. It would simply reduce some of the privileges that normally are provided to asylum claimants in order to reduce their willingness to pay tens of thousands of dollars to a smuggling syndicate.

One of the contentious aspects of the bill is the enhanced detention provisions. I would invite members of the opposition, perhaps at committee, to ask members of our Canada Border Services Agency and lawyers from my ministry about the difficulty of processing hundreds of smuggled asylum claimants who are seeking release from detention, because we have to do detention reviews under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act every two, seven and then subsequent 30 days. This means that with several hundred people we have a non-stop revolving door of detention reviews which is massively inefficient.

I would also point out there has been a red herring created by the opposition about mandatory detention for up to a year of all smuggled migrants. The minister, under the bill, would have the authority to release people in exceptional circumstances, such as children. Under the new asylum system adopted by Parliament last year in Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, bona fide asylum claimants will receive a positive protection decision and therefore permanent residency within about three months of making their claim. Such smuggled migrants in the asylum system who are bona fide refugees would be automatically released from immigration detention when they receive a positive asylum decision, and permanent residency in about 90 days.

Let me point out by way of comparison, because there is a lack of perspective in context here, that most of our peer democracies, most other liberal democracies, including those governed by social democratic parties such as the Labour government in Australia, have mandatory detention for all or almost all asylum claimants, not just illegally smuggled asylum claimants, but all or almost all asylum claimants.

That was the law adopted by the United Kingdom under the previous social democratic Labour government. That is the law in Australia under the social democratic Labour government.

I remember Prime Minister Gillard of Australia congratulating the NDP on its 50th anniversary. She actually defends a policy that puts under permanent detention all asylum claimants until their status is resolved. This is, by comparison, a radically more modest approach which only addresses illegally smuggled migrants for a limited period of time until they receive status, which under the new system would be three months.

In closing, the bill constitutes a balanced and humane approach to combatting the scourge of human smuggling. It would allow access to our refugee protection system for bona fide victims of persecution. It would reduce the massive pressure on our system when we face hundreds of people arriving at the same time. It would provide disincentives for people to pay tens of thousands of dollars to criminal networks to be smuggled illegally to Canada, and it would encourage them rather to seek regional resettlement opportunities or protection, if they are indeed refugees.

This is a bill that Canadians expect and demand. We must stand up for our tradition of protection of refugees and our legal and generous immigration system by combatting those who would abuse our country's generosity.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there are two points I want to make very quickly.

The first point is that those individuals who seek asylum in this country and who deserve asylum as refugees will receive it. There is absolutely no question. This legislation would not change any of that from happening. It will not, it cannot and it shall not.

The second point is this. I know the member was elected in a byelection in the previous Parliament, so he was here for part of it. We introduced this legislation in the last Parliament. We literally begged the opposition to support it, at least at second reading, so that we could get this legislation to a legislative committee to study it and try to work with them. I can explain to members that on two occasions both Bill C-35, the crooked consultants act, and Bill C-11, the refugee reform legislation, ended up coming back to the House and after negotiation and work passed unanimously. Every member sitting on the opposite side who was here in the last Parliament said no to that opportunity.

We are not going to say no to Canadians. It is back in the House. It is a priority. We said it was a priority. Those on this side of the House keep their word.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to this issue this morning and have the chance to listen to my hon. colleague. I congratulate him as a critic at our committee. I look forward to working with him and his party as we work through a number of issues at citizenship and immigration, including this bill dealing with public safety.

I am very grateful for the chance to rise and support Bill C-4 and its legislation therein. It will allow Canada to crack down on dangerous and illegal human smuggling operations while still maintaining our long and proud tradition of providing a safe haven for refugees.

As several of my hon. colleagues have noted, Canada is a compassionate country that welcomes immigrants and refugees from all over the world. In fact, every year we welcome about 250,000 newcomers to our country, which includes granting asylum to more than 10,000 persecuted persons each year and resettling another 12,000 refugees from abroad. In 2010, we welcomed close to 280,000 new immigrants to our country, one of the highest numbers in post-war history.

Let me point out, when we passed the refugee reform legislation in the last Parliament, Bill C-11, contingent upon the passing of that legislation was that we as a country would accept on a yearly basis an additional 2,500 refugees to our country. It speaks to the compassion, care and concern this government has for refugees across the world. Quite honestly, that bill passed with unanimous consent. My congratulations to everyone in the House who chose to do what was right for our country, what was right for refugees and to ensure that we passed a piece of legislation that is good for Canada as well as those refugees who see Canada as their new home. In helping refugees begin a new life Canadians are helping to ensure that we maintain our international obligations and at the same time build stronger and safe communities and fulfill the promise of Canada, the most welcoming nation in the world.

Our government is committed not only to preserving but also strengthening this already impressive track record. As I noted, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which received royal assent on June 29, 2010, will allow us to help more people and do it faster. We have committed significant dollars to ensure that this process and program is implemented to the best of our ability as a government and the best of our ability as a civil service. We have set aside that funding and the person power in order to implement the changes to the asylum system as well as to resettle an additional 2,500 refugees on top of what we already accept as a nation.

The government and many Canadians believe that Canada's generosity should not be extended to criminal smuggling. There is a significant difference when one talks about human compassion and treatment of refugees and the sick and utterly despised human smuggling system on which the government is prepared to take action to ensure it is lowered and lessened. Unfortunately, it will be difficult to get rid of it entirely. However, we strive to lower and lessen the opportunity for human smugglers to make money off the backs of other people in this world.

One of the strongest commitments our government made to Canadians when we were first elected in 2006 was that we would take action to make our streets, our homes and our communities safer for everyone. We delivered on that commitment in a number of ways. Again, when it relates to illegal smuggling operations of all kinds that are of concern to law enforcement officers, as well as all Canadians, the government has taken action to crack down on such increasingly dangerous and violent operations.

Shutting down these organized criminal networks is vitally important to both protecting the health of Canadians, as well as their safety and security. Our message in dealing with illegal smuggling operations has been crystal clear. Canada will take decisive action to protect our borders, as well as the safety and security of the law-abiding citizens who are proud to call this great country home.

Human smuggling poses significant risks to our borders and to all Canadians. It is a criminal activity that calls out for action both domestically, which we will implement with C-4, and internationally. That is what Canadians want. It is what they have asked for and that is what our government will do.

The bottom line is that human smuggling undermines Canada's security. Large-scale arrivals make it difficult to properly identify those who arrive, including the smugglers. They hide on these ships. They dress themselves exactly the same way as the potential refugees. It is almost impossible, and it takes a tremendous amount of work of both the CBSA, Canada Border Services Agency, and our RCMP officers to try to determine who will apply for refugee status and who is a smuggler.

Human smuggling is not just a profitable business; it is also dangerous and it puts the lives of those being smuggled in jeopardy.

I was in Vancouver, British Columbia to see the ship that brought those poor individuals to our country. It is one thing the opposition may not like to talk about, but the fact is these ships are not cruise ships, they are literally containers to stuff human life into. The ships are put out to sea in the hope that it shows up on the shore of a country that will accept it. This trip is probably the most dangerous trip that these individuals will have to face.

To do that to individuals, including children, is abhorrent, unacceptable and the government will ensure that it stops in our country. Under the Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act, our government is cracking down on human smugglers in a number of different ways.

The proposed legislation will enable the Minister of Public Safety to declare the existence of a human smuggling event, making those involved subject to the act's measures. It will make it easier to prosecute human smugglers. It will impose mandatory minimum prison sentences on convicted smugglers. It will also hold the shipowners and operators to account for the use of their ships in human smuggling operations.

These are proposed reforms which our government is proposing. They will help the safety and security of our streets and our communities by providing for the mandatory detention of participants for up to one year or until a positive decision by the immigration and refugee board regarding their refugee claims, or whichever comes sooner, in order to allow for the determination of identity, the identity admissibility and illegal activity.

It is unfair, unwarranted and unacceptable that in this day and age ships like these come into port and the individuals on those ships are simply allowed to move into the general population of our country. We cannot have that happen. We do not know who is on those ships. We have no idea whether there are serious criminals, smugglers or shipowners on them.

The process to determine the history of the individuals, the potential criminal activity of some of those individuals and the fairness upon which some of those individuals will receive refugee status in our country has to be done properly and right to ensure the safety of all individuals on the ship and all of the 34 million Canadians in our country.

Under the proposed act, our government is also reducing the attraction of coming to Canada by way of illegal human smuggling operations. We will prevent those who come to Canada as part of human smuggling events from applying for permanent residence status for a period of five years, should they successfully obtain refugee status, and prevent such individuals from sponsoring family members for a period of at least five years. These are not easy decisions to make. They are difficult ones to make in terms of how we will process individuals and families ending up on these ships.

Whether it is the United Nations, or international bodies or governments in our country, we have to stop the smugglers from doing this. It is not enough just to try to attempt to go after them internationally. We have to let smugglers know that it will be difficult for them to fill those ships, because individuals will not want to risk what may happen to them in the process of coming over.

Furthermore, after the passage of the act, our government will also make administrative changes to ensure that participants in a human smuggling events do not receive health care benefits that are any more generous than those that Canadians receive now. From my perspective, having gone across the country holding town hall meetings with a number of my colleagues, this is one of the principle parts of what it is to be Canadian, and we exude that with the principle of fairness.

Canadians accept and understand our role from an international perspective to help those who need it most. We have shown that during tragic incidents, such as what happened in Haiti. We have shown that in our acceptance and our obligation, punching above our weight in terms of the number of refugees that we accept from the United Nations to come to our country each and every year.

What we cannot do, and what Canadians do not want us to do, is to move beyond the principle of fairness. If those who come to our country receive health care benefits that exceed the benefits Canadians receive, then we need to act, and Canadians have asked us to act. We are doing just that in this legislation.

As the minister has noted, the reforms that our government is proposing are tough. We are not saying anything else about that. They are tough, but they are fair.

While Canada has a proud history and a tradition of welcoming immigrants who wish to start a new life here, Canada's generous immigration system has become a target for human smuggling operations. We must take action to end the abuse of Canada's immigration system by human smugglers because it is not acceptable. The majority of Canadians do not accept it and the majority of people in the House of Commons do not accept it. However, to do so we must have laws and measures in place that will deter and prevent these operations.

Canada's refugee resettlement program is one of the most generous in the developed world. As I mentioned, there is no country, on a per capita basis, that accepts more refugees than Canada. We continually punch above our weight when it comes to showing care and compassion for those who need it the most. Canada is one of the most generous countries in the developed world. On average, we take one out of every ten refugees from around the world who wants to resettle here, and it is a big world.

That speaks to the acceptance that we have as Canadians and it speaks to what we as a government believe must be maintained and be continued in the future. However, we must do so under some principles, issues, laws and measures that make sense to us as a government, but also meet the common sense rule and the principle of fairness rule that Canadians have asked us to do.

The critic for the NDP mentioned the issue of a queue not existing. Individuals in refugee camps have lived in squalor and have done so for the last five to ten years. They have been determined by the UN to be refugees. We as a country have an obligation to accept our fair and higher percentage than that which has been slated for us.

We are shutting the doors on individuals and potential families coming here when a boat with 500 individuals on it comes in. It may slightly open the door for the opportunity for a new life for those individuals who have been smuggled here, but it shuts the door on those who are already refugees who have been waiting for that same opportunity to begin a new life.

I beg to differ with my hon. friend. We have a process when these ships come here. It sets in place what we have determined is an acute problem with queue-jumping. When those ships cannot rest in any port across our country, then we do not have queue-jumping. Instead we have a fair process that has been determined by the United Nations to be an extremely good one.

All sides of the House of Commons determined that reform was necessary in our refugee legislation, and that was passed unanimously. We are now coming close to the end of the implementation point where this process, the new refugee act, will now begin. It has been hailed across the world as a system that will improve what has already been considered by many to be one of the best systems in the world.

It is unfair to those who have patiently waited, through legitimate means, to come to our country to have human smugglers illegally bring people into our country. It is that simple and the Canadian public understands this. In every town hall meeting, whether they were in total support of the legislation or had some difficulty with parts of it, one point individuals did not argue with was the fact that Canada had a principle of fairness that it acted upon when it came to all of its international obligations, specifically in dealing with refugee reform.

Queue jumping is not fair. It is not fair to people in our country and it is not fair to those who have been determined to be refugees to come here. That principle upon which fairness exists has to start and this legislation would help do that. When this happens, Canada's immigration system becomes less fair. More than that, our safety is actually threatened by criminal or terrorist organizations that can and often do use proceeds from human smuggling operations to fund other more violent activities, which pose a significant threat to our way of life.

No one in the House can tell me that these individuals who pay $20,000, $30,000, $40,000 and sometimes upwards of $50,000 for a place on what is deemed to be a boat have it in their pocket to do so. There is an obligation, in fact a price, that is on each one of those individuals to repay the exorbitant fee, the rip-off. The human smugglers could care less whether these individuals survive, only that the demanded payment is made in order to get these people from their country of origin. Those individuals spend their lifetime trying to repay that loan and they live in fear doing so. They have no idea what recriminations will be put upon them if they are unable to do so.

This circle of human smuggling has to stop. We have to find a way to erase the circle and not have it exist in the fashion that it has with Canada being a haven for these ships. Human smugglers cram individuals onto a ship and let it sail into a Canadian port. We will not let that happen in a way that Canada is seen across the world as the place to do this, or that Canada is a place for them to take a chance with hundreds or thousands of lives. It will not happen anymore. We are determined as a government to put a stop to it.

Canadians have told us en mass across the country. We just fought an election over a number of issues and this was one of them. Canadians sent us back to govern. They sent us here to implement this bill because they believe it is right legislation and it is timely. Perhaps it should have been implemented decades ago.

Under the legislation, the very ship that my hon. colleague from the NDP spoke about would not have been turned away. It would have had an opportunity. There would be a process in place with legislation and regulations that would work.

I look forward to getting the bill to committee. I look forward to getting this bill back for second reading and implementing the legislation.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to pick up where things left off in June. Right before the long debate on back-to-work legislation I had the opportunity to speak to this bill for eight minutes. At that point I was making three general observations.

The first is that refugees are not queue jumpers. There is a misconception across the land that when refugees come to Canada and claim refugee status, they are depriving others who would like to come to Canada of their right to do so. I say sadly that it is the government that has actually fostered this notion. Do not take my word for it; I will quote from an editorial in the Ottawa Citizen which stated the following:

Back in 2010, [the] Public Safety Minister...said the government needed to crack down on human smuggling because “we know that jumping the immigration queue is fundamentally unfair to those who follow the rules and wait their turns to come to Canada.”

This is the opposite of what is true about refugees.

Of course, no one likes queue jumpers. We all have a natural aversion to the idea of someone cutting into line. However, refugees are not queue jumpers. By letting a refugee into Canada, we are not slowing down or otherwise causing a regular immigration application to be sidelined. It is very important to make that point.

The second point I would like to make is related to the first point. There is a process for determining who is a legitimate refugee and who is a person whose claim is without proper merit. That process goes back at least 20 years, if I am not mistaken, or maybe a little less than 20 years. We know that that process is embodied in an institution of government that we call the Immigration and Refugee Board.

The third point I would like to make is related to the first two. The reason there is a refugee crisis in this country, the reason there is a backlog of refugee claimants, has a lot to do with the way the government, unfortunately, has undermined the refugee determination process that is embodied in the Immigration and Refugee Board.

We all know that the government failed to fill vacancies on the Immigration and Refugee Board for quite a long time, to the extent that the lack of desire to move in terms of appointing new members to the IRB was having and impact and creating the backlog in refugee claims. In fact, the Auditor General in 2009 expressed her concerns about timely and efficient appointments and reappointments to the IRB when she looked at the matter of the refugee backlog.

What has happened is the government has politicized the process of appointing people to the IRB which has made the backlog even worse.

It is very important that the government own up to this. First, it must admit that refugees are not queue jumpers. Second, it must admit that it has made the problem of the refugee backlog slightly worse because it failed previously to act quickly in terms of appointing members to the board.

There are problems with this bill. It creates two classes of refugees. One class would be the regular refugee stream. The second class would be denoted by the minister as designated arrivals, which, upon being designated accordingly, would be treated differently. They could be held in detention for up to 12 months.

What is really happening is the government is categorizing refugees. It is creating classes of refugees for different treatment based on, if we really look at it and read between the lines, the mode of transport the refugee claimants have used to get here. Refugees who come by plane typically would not come in big groups and would not receive the ministerial designation of designated foreign nationals and would not receive the different treatment that is being reserved for designated foreign nationals in this bill. Refugees who come in groups who will be designated as designated foreign nationals under the act typically will come by ship in squalid conditions. If they come by plane, they are not considered to be designated foreign nationals under the law.

The government is creating different classes of refugees based on how the refugees come to Canada. Following that logic, there should be a class of refugees for those arriving by minivan. It is very unhealthy when we start to distinguish and create categories of people from what is essentially a group of people with the same characteristics, people who are fleeing persecution or misery for a better life.

This brings me to another point. Back in June when I first spoke to this bill, I said that the government seems to make legislation based on the latest headlines. Instead of analyzing a situation over the long term and coming up with a solution that has some merit, it will react very quickly to news, especially before an election. It will bring in rushed legislation which obviously will have flaws because any legislation that is rushed will have flaws. It will bring in legislation to try to show the public that it is acting quickly to solve a problem, which sometimes is very complex and requires more reflection than it is receiving.

When the government introduced Bill C-49, which is now Bill C-4, it had already brought in Bill C-11 about a year before. Bill C-11 was meant to attack the problem of the growing refugee backlog the government itself had contributed to making worse. Under Bill C-11, the government implemented something that had been created by a Liberal government. It brought in a refugee appeal division to speed up the process whereby when a claimant is refused by the IRB, he or she may appeal to the Federal Court. The government said it would implement something that a Liberal government came up with, which was the refugee appeals division.

I should mention that has not yet been implemented, as far as I know. Bill C-11 tried to remedy this situation but there have been more delays in terms of creating the refugee appeal division. In any event, Bill C-11 was attempting to deal with the problem. We still do not know if Bill C-11 would deal effectively with the problem because the appeals division has not been created. Why did the government not let things be and allow Bill C-11 to work its way through to implementation to see if it was able to resolve the matter before introducing Bill C-4? That is quite indicative of the fact that the government prefers to rush into things, sometimes with measures that are half-baked or not called for.

A major problem with Bill C-4 is that it probably violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. That is what happens when legislation is rushed: we get legislation that is not thought through and is not properly put together. It means the legislation could be challenged and if it is challenged, it may be struck down. That would create more problems down the line. A government should really do things properly or it may find itself with problems down the line.

Bill C-4 possibly could violate the Charter of Rights and Freedoms because of the fact that a person may be kept in detention for up to 12 months. We have seen jurisprudence by the Supreme Court find that time far too long and in violation of at least two sections of the charter.

I will stop on that point and take the opportunity to move an amendment. I move:

That the motion be amended by deleting all of the words after the word “That” and substituting the following:

'this House declines to give 2nd reading to Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and the Marine Transportation Security Act, since the bill fails to achieve its stated principle of cracking down on human smugglers and instead targets legitimate refugee claimants and refugees, and because it expands the Minister's discretion in a manner that is overly broad and not limited to the mass arrival situation that supposedly inspired the introduction of this legislation, and because it presents an imprisonment scheme that violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms protections against arbitrary detention and prompt review of detention, and because its provisions also violate international obligations relating to refugees and respecting the treatment of persons seeking protection.'

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

There are actually two streams of refugees. There are the ones that have applied outside Canada and then get sponsored by churches or by the government to bring them to Canada. There are about 4,000 or 5,000 like that. Then there are about 9,000 who have already landed in Canada and have applied for refugee status here.

The 4,000 or 5,000 who have applied outside Canada now have to wait about four or five years in refugee camps before they can make it into Canada. Therefore, the first thing the government should do is to shorten the wait times and ensure that these refugees in war-torn countries can come to Canada quickly. That is not the case right now.

Second, the wait list for those who are in Canada and are applying for refugee status in Canada has dramatically increased because the backlog has increased. Why? It is because the government, from 2006 to 2010, was not filling the vacant spots on the refugee board. As a result, the refugee board had no members to determine whether or not these were real refugees. Therefore, the backlog grew and the wait times became one or two or three years. It has become intolerable.

Therefore, last year the New Democratic Party of Canada worked with the government to approve Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, to make the refugee-determination process faster and fairer. That bill got fast-tracked and was approved. All the government has to do is to implement its own law.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I'm sorry we had some technical difficulties, and we're glad you're on the air. You appeared before us before, I think, for Bill C-11. We thank you again for taking the time to speak to us on this subject.

You have up to five minutes, sir, to make a presentation to us.

[Simon Coakeley]

Bill C-11will have a huge impact on refugee times at the RPD. In fact, we were discussing it yesterday at our chairs' management board.

As I indicated earlier, the current average wait time for a hearing is about 22.5 months. As you know, under Bill C-11 we will have to conduct an initial interview within 15 days of the claim being referred to us. Depending on whether the person is from a designated country of origin or not, the hearing would commence either 60 or 90 days after the interview. We expect that approximately 80% of decisions will be rendered from the bench at the hearing, and that is going to be our working target.

Once the claimant has the written copy of the decision in hand, from the regulations that CIC will be proposing, we understand they'll have 15 days to file and perfect their appeal. It again depends on where the person comes from; if the person is from a designated country of origin, the new refugee appeal division would have to render its decision within 30 days. If it's a case that doesn't come from a designated country of origin, the decision could be in up to 120 days.

As you can see, if you add up all of the numbers, it still comes to a significantly lower number than the current 22.5 months.

For the committee's information, when Brian Goodman, our chair, appeared before you on Bill C-11 back in the spring, there was a discussion about our staffing processes. I'd like to confirm for the committee--

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Thank you.

I think, Ms. Grewal, you're pointing to a number of issues that I would categorize as reinforcing and defending the integrity of the immigration system. One positive step in that direction was the adoption of Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act, which is in process; we're working towards its implementation later this year. That will, we believe, disincentivise false asylum seekers from abusing Canada's asylum system. In the end, it will result in fewer false asylum claims being filed in Canada, which will, we project, save taxpayers as much as $1.8 billion over five years.

Secondly, as you know, we brought in the cracking down on crooked immigration consultants act, which is now in the Senate. By the way, I encouraged the official opposition to ask Senator Jaffer to get that bill through the Senate. It received unanimous support. That will help us to deal with ghost consultants, make it a criminal offence for them to operate without being licensed immigration consultants of the recognized regulatory body, and we're also, as you know, working on the process of designating a regulatory body.

Also, it's very important that we address, as you mentioned, the issue of human smuggling. We believe that Bill C-49 represents a strong but balanced approach to addressing the smuggling networks, basically criminal gangs, that are targeting Canada. These are groups that don't really care about human life. They regard people as commodities. Particular syndicates used to run guns and other contraband into Sri Lanka during the civil war; now they're running people. Every year, thousands of people around the world die in smuggling operations. We've seen that recently in Britain, in Australia, in Mexico, the United States. Certainly one person passed away on the last vessel coming to Canada. These syndicates are using dangerous, decommissioned, leaky vessels to cross the Pacific Ocean.

I don't think any of us as parliamentarians, as Canadians, should be sanguine or indifferent about the threat that poses to human life, or indeed the integrity of our immigration system. That's why we have a balanced bill that seeks to send a message to the smuggling syndicates and their prospective customers, who after all are willing customers, that they shouldn't be willing to pay $30,000 to $45,000 to a smuggling syndicate to come to Canada. They should think twice about it. We think the five-year period in the bill does that, and we would call on the opposition to take seriously the expectation of Canadians that we will defend the integrity of our system against those who seek to abuse it.

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

You're talking about the refugees. Right now we have two bills, Bill C-11 and Bill C-49. We want to make sure that the bogus refugees can't stay in Canada forever.

Do you think your Canadian customers will appreciate that they are not subsidizing fake refugees? Because there could be people coming to the pharmacists claiming that.

[Simon Coakeley, Executive Director, Office of the Executive Director, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Good morning, everyone.

As you heard, my name is Simon Coakeley and I am the Executive Director of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. I am the board's Chief Operating Officer and am responsible for the performance of the board's adjudicative support, registry and corporate support services. I report directly to the Chairperson, Mr. Brian Goodman.

I am joined today by Ms. Diane Lacelle, our Director General of Human Resources and Professional Development; Ms. Sylvia Cox-Duquette, our Senior General Counsel; and Mr. Serge Gascon, our Director General of Corporate Planning and Services and our Official Languages Champion.

We are pleased to have this opportunity to meet with the committee and to provide you with information about how the IRB meets its linguistic obligations under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Official Languages Act.

Like all federal institutions, the IRB is subject to Parts 4, 5, 6 and 7 of the Official Languages Act, and I will discuss these parts in a few minutes. However, as an administrative tribunal, we are also subject to Part 3 of the act dealing with the administration of justice. In addition, the charter principles of access to justice also apply to our everyday work in terms of individuals' rights to use English or French in our proceedings, but also in terms of our obligation to ensure that the individuals and witnesses who do not speak either English or French are able to understand the proceedings in which they are participating. In the next few minutes, I would like to outline how we meet these obligations.

The Immigration and Refugee Board is Canada's largest administrative tribunal. The board is currently composed of three divisions: the Refugee Protection Division determines refugee claims made in Canada; the Immigration Appeal Division decides appeals of removal orders, sponsorship refusals and residency obligation appeals; the Immigration Division conducts reviews of immigration detentions and conducts hearings to determine if persons may lawfully enter or remain in Canada. When the Balanced Refugee Reform Act comes into force, a new Refugee Appeal Division will be created to hear appeals from the Refugee Protection Division.

Each of our three divisions conducts hearings across the country, primarily in our regional offices located in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. We also conduct some hearings in our facilities in Ottawa and Calgary, as well as at other locations across the country, including a number of provincial correctional institutions.

According to our departmental performance report, in the last fiscal year our divisions finalized more than 55,000 cases, broken down as follows: at the RPD, 28,500 refugee claims; at the lAD, 7,200 appeals; at the ID, 3,150 admissibility hearings and 16,500 detention reviews.

All of the people appearing before us as subjects of proceedings are asked to indicate to us at the earliest possible time whether they wish their proceeding to be conducted in English or French. In addition, if the subject does not speak either English or French, we ask them to indicate their need for interpretation into English or French. Once the subject has indicated their choice of the language of proceedings, all material submitted by CBSA, acting on behalf of the Minister of Public Safety or the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, must be filed in the language of proceedings; if the original documentation is in another language, it must be translated into the language of proceedings, in accordance with the applicable divisional rule. When the matter is ready, it is scheduled for a hearing before a board member who is able to understand the matter in the language chosen by the subject.

In practise, the majority of French proceedings are assigned to a member whose first language is French, just as the majority of English proceedings are assigned to a member whose first language is English. Prior to the beginning of a hearing, or even during the hearing itself, the subject may choose to change the language of the proceeding. If the minister's representative has any objections to changing the language once the hearing has started, the presiding member will provide the minister's representative with an opportunity to make submissions, prior to granting the request to change the language of proceedings. In the event that the minister's representative is not able to proceed immediately in the new language, the matter will be adjourned to allow the minister time to prepare. Any additional documentation will have to be filed in the new language of proceedings.

The minister will not be required to translate documents already filed in the original language of proceedings. This approach was recently endorsed by the Federal Court.

In some instances, the subject of proceedings before the board will be represented by counsel whose first language is different from the one selected by his or her client. In those circumstances, the board will ensure that interpretation is provided so that the subject of the proceedings is fully able to understand and participate in the proceedings. The language of the proceedings, though—in other words, the language in which the board member will render his or her decision—is the language chosen by the subjects themselves.

All of our divisions are able to conduct business across the country in both English and French. However, the demand for French-language hearings is concentrated in our eastern region, while the demand for English-language hearings is somewhat more evenly spread across the country.

As of December 14, two days ago, the linguistic breakdown of our decision-makers was the following. In the eastern region, we have 54 members, of whom 44 are bilingual, seven are unilingual French, and three are unilingual English. In the central region, we have 111 members, of whom nine are bilingual and 102 are unilingual English. In the western region, we have 38 members, of whom six are bilingual and 32 are unilingual English. A copy of this information was provided to the clerk prior to this morning's session.

As I've also already mentioned, once a case is ready to proceed, it is assigned to a member who is able to understand the language of the proceeding. In the event that no member from that region is available to hear the matter in the language selected, a member from another region can hear the case either by video conference or in person.

These obligations are enshrined in both the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Official Languages Act, and they're reinforced in our own rules. As we are a quasi-judicial administrative tribunal, they also go to the very heart of the IRB's raison d'être and our strategic objective, which is to resolve immigration and refugee matters efficiently, fairly, and in accordance with the law.

This is an obligation we take very seriously. But in addition to this very specific obligation, as I mentioned earlier, we're also subject to parts IV through VII of the Official Languages Act, as are other federal institutions.

In terms of service to the public, in addition to our Ottawa headquarters, our offices in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver are able to provide service in both languages to the public, and our Ottawa headquarters and Montreal offices are designated as being bilingual for the purposes of language of work.

While we're proud of our successes and progress to date, we also recognize that we live in an ever-changing environment where the level of demand for our service in a specific language can vary over time, just as our capacity to deliver the required level of service. Consequently, we're very proud to have a very engaged group of employees on our official languages advisory committee, which is chaired by our champion, Serge Gascon. This committee has adopted a two-year action plan that highlights the need for us to continue to focus on specific issues under parts III, IV, V, and VII of the Official Languages Act. A copy of the plan was provided to the clerk ahead of this morning's meeting.

The action plan was adopted before Bill C-11 was introduced in Parliament, and as we implement the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, the issue of structuring and staffing the new public servant-based refugee protection division and the new refugee appeal division in such a way that we continue to discharge our linguistic obligations to the people appearing before those divisions will be a significant priority. In that regard, I can indicate that when the new RPD positions are staffed sometime in the new year, we will be identifying the number of positions in each of our regions that will need to be staffed on a bilingual imperative basis, and these bilingual positions will be rated at the CCC level.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, my colleagues and I will be very pleased to answer your questions.

Immigration and Refugee Protection Act

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Madam Speaker, as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, I am pleased to rise today to commence third reading of Bill C-35, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

This important piece of legislation would strengthen the rules governing those who charge a fee for immigration advice and representation. I hope at the end of the day that all hon. members will support the bill.

Over the past four years, this government has proposed and implemented initiatives and policies that clearly demonstrate a commitment to innovation and to improvement. Hon. members will recall that we modernized our immigration system by bringing flexibility to the way we select immigrants while tackling the backlog. We had to fix our immigration system or else the number of people waiting to come here would have swelled to over 1.5 million by 2012.

To improve Canada's asylum system, the minister introduced earlier this year the balanced refugee reform act. Its implementation will mean faster protection for those who genuinely need it and fast removals of bogus refugees who simply do not.

Now it is time to address the lack of public confidence in the regulation of immigration consultants. We all know that people anxious to immigrate to Canada can fall victim to unscrupulous immigration representatives who charge exorbitant fees and may promise would-be immigrants high-paying jobs or guaranteed, fast-tracked visas.

We have all heard or read about their unscrupulous and deceitful schemes such as encouraging prospective immigrants to lie on their applications, to concoct bogus stories about persecution while making refugee claims or to enter into sham marriages with Canadian citizens and permanent residents. In their quest for personal gain these unscrupulous representatives have displayed a wanton disregard for our immigration rules, bilked numerous people out of their hard-earned dollars and left countless lives in tatters along the way. These crooked immigration representatives are a menace, posing a costly threat not only to their victims but also to the integrity and fairness of our system.

Bill C-35 would amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act so that only members in good standing of a law society of a province, the Chambre des notaires du Québec or a body designated by the minister may represent or advise for a fee, or offer to do so at any stage of a proceeding or application.

Under the current legislation, the involvement of representatives in the pre-application or pre-submission period is beyond the scope of the law. Well, I am happy to say that Bill C-35 fixes that. By our casting a wider net, unauthorized individuals who provide paid advice or representation at any stage would be subject to a fine and/or imprisonment. This includes undeclared ghost consultants who operate in the shadows and conceal their involvement in an application or proceeding.

Further, there are currently no mechanisms in law that give the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism the authority to oversee the governing body regulating immigration consultants. The bill would provide the minister with the power by regulation to designate a body to govern immigration consultants and provide the Governor in Council the ability to establish measures to enhance the government's oversight of that designated body.

Citizenship and Immigration Canada is currently limited in its ability to disclose to the relevant governing body information on individuals providing unethical or unprofessional representation or advice. The bill would allow CIC to disclose such information to those responsible for governing or investigating that conduct, so we can work together to crack down on crooked consultants. An investigation could be undertaken more readily by the appropriate governing body and, where appropriate, disciplinary action pursued.

As we all know, governing bodies are responsible for taking disciplinary action against their members in cases of misconduct. This includes the revocation of membership. The governing body for immigration consultants can, like other bodies, investigate the conduct of its members where there is a concern that a member has breached a term of his or her membership. Provincial law societies use a similar process to look into complaints concerning their own members.

This bill is a comprehensive proposal to provide protection for vulnerable would-be immigrants by imposing serious criminal sanctions on unscrupulous representatives, enhancing oversight of the governing body for immigration consultants and improving information-sharing tools.

Since its introduction, Bill C-35 has received positive feedback from stakeholders, the media and Canadians, all of whom believe that this change was long overdue.

Throughout the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration study of Bill C-35, the minister and government committee members listened to the concerns raised and, accordingly, have adjusted the bill in a way that we believe can only strengthen it. That is what I said. We adjusted the bill accordingly during our consultations at committee.

For example, the government proposed the recognition of paralegals regulated by a law society. By recognizing the ability of law societies to govern their members in the public interest, such recognition could help protect would-be immigrants.

In response to concerns raised in good faith by parliamentarians, we also agreed to a number of amendments that reflect their input, resulting in language that, I believe, has strengthened this bill.

These amendments create a package that would realize our goal of cracking down on unscrupulous immigration representatives who exploit prospective would-be immigrants.

The offence provision found in Bill C-35 has been amended to capture both direct and indirect representation and advice. Penalties have been toughened by increasing the maximum fine for the offence of providing unauthorized immigration advice from $50,000 to $100,000; and summary convictions from $10,000 to $20,000.

The statute of limitations for summary conviction has also been increased to 10 years, offering investigators ample time to properly and fully investigate various offences committed under the act and lay charges before the time period passes.

In addition, for greater clarity, the government proposed a compromise amendment, which would respect Quebec's jurisdiction while maintaining federal authority over the regulation of immigration consultants.

The intention of this provision is to recognize that the province's act respecting immigration to Quebec applies to immigration consultants who, for consideration, advise or represent a person who files an application with the Quebec minister or government.

This amendment is not intended to capture immigration consultants who are advising or representing a person with regard to processes or requirements only under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, where these processes or requirements do not relate to Quebec legislation.

The proposed reforms follow the launch in 2009 of a public information campaign with information on the web in Canada, at missions abroad and through the media, explaining to Canadians how our immigration system works.

At the same time that Bill C-35 moves through the legislative process, a public selection process has been undertaken, under current authority, to identify a governing body for recognition as the regulator of immigration consultants.

In 2008 and 2009, reports of the standing committee pointed to a lack of public confidence in the body currently governing immigration consultants. This lack of public confidence poses a significant and immediate threat to the immigration program and its process.

Public comments on the selection process were solicited in June. This was followed by a call for submissions, as published in the Canada Gazette on August 28.

This open and transparent process is being undertaken in order to ensure that the body governing immigration consultants can effectively regulate its members, thus ensuring public confidence in the integrity of our immigration program.

A selection committee, composed of officials from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration, other federal government organizations and external experts, will examine all of the completed submissions against the criteria listed in the call for submissions that I spoke of earlier.

The selection committee will provide the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism with a recommendation as to which organizations, if any, has or have demonstrated the necessary organizational competencies.

Any and all potential and interested candidates are welcome to apply, including the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants.

This ongoing public selection process, together with the legislative changes proposed in Bill C-35, ensure the most efficient and the most effective approach to strengthening the regulation of immigration consultants, immediately and in the future. However, as we know all too well, there are large numbers of immigration consultants who operate beyond our borders.

The problem we are trying to address is large in scale and it is international in scope. The value of coming to Canada is so great in the minds of so many that they are often willing to pay their life savings in cash, and beyond, to unscrupulous representatives with the false promise of obtaining visas to visit or to move to Canada. That is why, when the minister met in September with some of our international partners, he underscored the need for combined action to thwart fraud and various forms of exploitation by unscrupulous immigration representatives.

The commission of fraud under Canada's immigration program is a crime that threatens the integrity of our immigration system, raises security concerns, wastes tax dollars, is unfair to those who do follow the rules and adds to the processing time for legitimate applications. We are fortunate that Canada's visa officers are extremely vigilant in preventing the exploitation of victims, but every fake document and false story we find slows down the entire system and diverts our resources away from legitimate applications. That is because our fraud deterrents and verification efforts, while effective, require much more time and resources than routine processing of applications.

Members can see why we are determined to crack down on immigration fraud or misrepresentation by unscrupulous immigration representatives. These unscrupulous representatives victimize people who dream of immigrating to this country. With no motive but greed, these profiteers take advantage of would-be immigrants and tempt them with a bogus bill of goods.

Needless to say, the underhanded schemes of unscrupulous representatives undermine the integrity and the fairness of Canada's immigration system. It is imperative that we tackle the threat they pose and this bill would allow us to do just that. The changes we propose would strengthen the rules governing those who provide immigration advice and representation for a fee, or offer to do so, and it would improve the way in which immigration consultants are regulated.

These changes are also in line with amendments we have proposed to the Citizenship Act to regulate citizenship consultants, which is Bill C-37 and will be coming to this House for second reading very shortly.

For far too long, unscrupulous immigration representatives have preyed upon the hopes and the dreams of would-be immigrants to our country. This disreputable conduct has brought shame to their profession and has abused our immigration system.

As was the case with Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, the spirit of compromise and co-operation surrounding this bill has again been remarkable. I should speak to that briefly.

The fact is that one of the things Canadians have asked this government to do, and have asked all parties in this House to do, is to do our best to work together, to not be seen as always opposing the position of each other for political gain or to embarrass each other, because at the end of the day, legislation that passes through this House must be good for Canadians. It must be effective and efficient in terms of the new law that it sets, the new standard that it sets, in legislation.

I have to say, having been a member, as a parliamentary secretary, of the citizenship and immigration committee since the 40th general election, it is in fact a testament to the group of people who have sat on that committee and the group of people who sit on the committee now that indeed, while we do have our political flare-ups and we do have our disagreements, we have in fact, with Bill C-11 and Bill C-35, found a way to work together.

I certainly want to credit my critic who, while being on the job for a little less than a year, has in fact taken up the challenge that his predecessor put in front of him in terms of ensuring that, if we are going to work on issues of citizenship, on issues of immigration and on issues of multiculturalism and because the laws of the country sit before that committee, we must work together on behalf of Canadians to move that legislation forward.

The citizenship and immigration committee certainly has set an example of the spirit of compromise. It is a testament that legislation requires the support not just of the government but of a number of individuals in order to get it through the House.

Bill C-35 is a testament to the compromise the government is prepared to make without surrendering its values or the importance of the legislation the government puts before the House. The government recognizes that in the spirit of compromise, in some cases, the amendments actually strengthen the legislation. Bill C-35 is stronger now than it was before it went to committee. I compliment the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration who understands the need to listen, respond and act when legislation is moving forward.

I think the vote on third reading of Bill C-35 will show the support throughout the House for this piece of legislation. This legislation stands for those people who come to this country to become Canadians because of the history and traditions that make Canada a great country. Many people want to become Canadian citizens.

It is important to note that this legislation is for prospective Canadians. It is not just for those who are already Canadian citizens. That speaks volumes to where we are going as a country in terms of the immigrants coming here to build better lives for themselves and to contribute to the Canadian way of life. This bill does a great job in terms of representing that direction.

It is my hope that the spirit of compromise and co-operation as seen during the committee's study of Bill C-35 will ensure the bill's passage in the House.

I want to note the tireless efforts of the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism. Many in the House know of his hard work.

I also want to compliment all of the members of the committee, in particular my colleagues who sit on the government side. All five of them put in hours and hours of effort to ensure that this bill would move forward and carry.

I want to thank the chairman of the committee who at times had to rule with an iron fist. At times, he had to ensure that even the parliamentary secretary kept his cool during the hearings. In fact, I moved a motion to challenge the chair. I lost that vote as the opposition members actually sided with the chairman, but I certainly respected his decision in that regard.

Despite the workings of some of the issues that arose, the chairman did an excellent job in guiding the committee through some difficult negotiations and discussions on the bill. He ensured that witnesses, members of the public from across the country, who wanted the opportunity to participate and speak to the bill in terms of what was good or in need of change were allowed to do so.

At the end of the day, we have a piece of legislation before this House of which all of us regardless of political stripe can be proud. The government will do its best to ensure that Bill C-35 is implemented quickly once it receives royal assent.

To conclude, I wish to thank the people who work at Citizenship and Immigration Canada. They did an amazing job in ensuring that this bill met all of the standards this government wanted it to meet.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Oh, great.

Look, we certainly work here in Ottawa...[Technical difficulty--Editor]...in a minority, but it is a democracy...[Technical difficulty--Editor]...at this committee proven that you can move bills forward, move legislation forward--Bill C-11 and Bill C-35, which is up for third reading debate tomorrow--and that we can find compromise and still maintain the integrity of a piece of legislation that is important to Canadians, to the running of our government, and to the fairness within the system you've just spoken of.

One of the options the opposition obviously has...and it is certainly within their realm and within their right to oppose legislation the government moves. But based on their input and their response to that, it's also important that we attempt to move legislation forward.

I'm asking you whether or not you have had any proposals put forward either from parties in this House, in terms of options that would see Bill C-49 move forward, or whether we've seen suggestions and comments from those who are opposed to the legislation, from organizations within this country that have said, look, we don't necessarily agree with the bill, but here are some options you could put forward, and perhaps we could move this bill forward.

[Nina Grewal, Conservative, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Can you please tell the committee about the cost savings that will result from Bill C-11?

[Nina Grewal, Conservative, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Minister, there is funding in the estimates for the implementation of Bill C-11. Could you please just update us on the status of this legislation?

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

But the other punitive measures, not the up-to-one-year detention, which we argue is not going to be constitutionally valid, are my bigger concern, because those measures are actually for people who have already been determined to be refugees. So if Bill C-11 works, this doesn't make sense to me.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

I think there may be some confusion here. The enhanced detention provisions for those arriving in designated smuggling operations would apply prior to the refugee determination, not following it. So 500 people arrive in a vessel and we need to determine who they are. They are currently put into detention. I think we're at month five for most of the Sun Sea arrivees.

The difference is that we have to go back constantly, sending lawyers and CBSA personnel into a revolving door at the IRB every 30 days for detention renewal just to say, look, we still don't know who they are. We need a period of time to be able to establish who these individuals are, especially when they come in large numbers and the system is really strained.

Under what we propose in Bill C-49, we would simply say we can detain people for up to a year without having to constantly go back for these renewals. This would allow us to focus our resources on the actual work of identification. And if during that year they get a positive determination as a refugee, they are automatically released.

By the way, under Bill C-11, which comes into effect next year, the bona fide refugees would be released from detention in two or three months. I don't think that's a firing squad. I think that's eminently reasonable.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

I think that Bill C-11 was a good comprehensive reform for the problems associated with the refugee protection system, but it was not sufficient to deal with the particular threats from the big human smuggling rings.

We need to have access to various tools. For example, in the area of visas, there has been a decline since 2008 in the number of refugee protection claims filed in Canada: from 38,000 to about 19,000, this year, and that is largely because of the visa requirement instituted in June 2008.

So there is not just one solution to the problems we're facing. Yes, a more efficient, speedier system, like the one we adopted in one sitting, is useful, as a general rule. But I don't think it is necessarily useful for the people who are prepared to pay $50,000 to come to Canada illegally.

[Inaudible--Editor] that these people are necessarily going to claim refugee protection.

As I said, in terms of the arrival of the Fujian vessels 10 years ago, they weren't really people looking for refugee protection, they were clearly actually people looking for jobs.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Thank you, Mr. Chair and colleagues.

I am pleased today to present to the Committee my department's supplementary estimates (B) for fiscal year 2010-2011.

I think the supplementary estimates are self-explanatory, but if you have questions, of course, we are here to answer them. Perhaps in my opening remarks I can provide a brief summary of new developments within the Department, our operations and our policies.

Last March, as you all know, we introduced Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, which received Royal Assent on June 29, 2010, of course after receiving the unanimous approval of both Houses of Parliament.

I would again like to thank my colleagues from all parties who worked on this.

This act will make Canada's refugee system more balanced, ensuring quicker protection for those who need it and quicker removals of those who don't. It will help deter those who would seek to abuse our immigration and refugee protection systems.

As part of these changes, Canada will also increase the number of resettled refugees by 20%, or 2,500 refugees per year. This includes 2,000 more spots in the private sponsorship program and 500 more government-assisted refugees. In addition, we will increase funding to the refugee assistance program. We've already started that work. This will give the refugees we resettle the support they need to begin their lives in Canada.

To promote these increases, I travelled across the country this summer to encourage individuals and organizations to become private sponsors, to become more involved in a revitalization of the private sponsorship refugee program. In particular, I urged them to become part of our humanitarian tradition by helping to provide a new beginning for victims of violence and persecution around the world, such as those forced to flee the cruelty and brutality of the Ahmadinejad regime in Iran and religious persecution in Iraq.

I should also mention that we've begun--or more than begun, we're well into--the hard work of implementation of the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. In fact, I've appointed, I believe, all of the additional IRB decision-makers for the refugee protection division who are necessary as part of our commitment to begin the process of backlog reduction.

Canada remains committed to protecting those who are most vulnerable. The Government of Canada is equally committed to upholding our laws and to protecting the integrity of our immigration and refugee systems.

That's why we've introduced legislation to crack down on crooked immigration consultants who promote fraud in our immigration program and victimize those who dream of immigrating to this great country.

I'd like to acknowledge Ms. Chow's advocacy that this initiative had to be twinned with our efforts on refugee reform.

As was the case with Bill C-11, this spirit of compromise and cooperation surrounding Bill C-35 has spoken, I think, very well to all parliamentarians on this committee.

We also introduced legislation that would strengthen the value of Canadian citizenship by making it easier to lose citizenship if it is improperly obtained, and we hope to begin debate upon second reading in the House in the near future.

But for Canadian citizenship to be meaningful, it also is essential that new and established Canadians alike share a common understanding of our rights and responsibilities, our institutions, our democratic traditions, and our history. That's why, just over a year ago, I was proud to launch Discover Canada: The Rights and Responsibilities of Citizenship, our popular new citizenship study guide, which is required reading for anyone seeking to become a Canadian citizen. In fact, the demands for the publication and tens of thousands of downloads from the website, as well as the very positive feedback, have been extraordinary.

This past March, my department began administering a new citizenship test based on Discover Canada. We expect new citizens to know about our country, so we've made the material and guide more comprehensive in scope. We strongly encourage citizenship applicants who want to do well on the test to study the new guide and familiarize themselves with their new country's history, symbols, values, and institutions.

To become a Canadian citizen, you also need to have knowledge of English or French. That obligation is set out in the Citizenship Act. Discover Canada is available as an audio version to help applicants who are still learning English or French study.

And since 2006, we have tripled funding to settlement services, including free language classes, after it had been previously frozen for years. That's meant an additional $1.4 billion over five years to enhance services that help newcomers integrate into Canadian society.

While the government helps immigrants integrate into our society, including through the provision of language training, we expect newcomers to take advantage of this support. What concerns me is that only about 25% of newcomers who qualify for free language classes have enrolled in federally funded classes. To ensure that all immigrants are able to fully integrate and participate in society, this is a number that we would like to see increase.

I'm very pleased to report today that we are well on our way to achieving this goal, as a result, in part, of a pilot project that we launched last fall, where we mailed language training vouchers to 2,000 randomly selected permanent residents. The preliminary results of the vouchers show that more than twice the number of immigrants who received vouchers enrolled in language classes than those who did not. We'll being seeing the final results of our assessment in the spring, and if they continue to be positive, we'll look at options to expand this approach.

We've also updated the multiculturalism program's objectives, placing a much greater emphasis on integration. Through its new objectives, the program will help build an integrated, socially cohesive society, and improve the responsiveness of institutions to the needs of a diverse population.

The Government is committed to improving the Temporary Foreign Worker Program to protect foreign workers and live-in caregivers from potential abuse and exploitation.

To this end, we proposed improvements to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program, including penalties for employers who fail in their commitments to their employees.

We also made changes to the live-in caregiver program to better protect these workers and make it easier and faster for them and their families to obtain permanent residency in Canada.

In addition, Mr. Chair, we have introduced important legislative amendments to Canada's immigration laws, which would help protect vulnerable foreign workers, such as exotic dancers, who could be victims of exploitation or human trafficking.

The government is committed to maintaining our tradition of welcoming newcomers from around the world, Mr. Chairman. In fact, it's likely that this year, we will see the largest number of newcomers landing in Canada as permanent residents in more than five decades. In 2011 we intend to welcome between 240,000 and 265,000 permanent residents. I understand my officials were before you last week to discuss the planned levels.

The Government of Canada also remains committed to using immigration in a way that best serves our economic needs.

That's why I'm pleased that Canada was able to lift the visa requirement for travellers with ordinary Taiwan passports. This is something we announced, I believe, just a week ago. This is the eighth visa that we've lifted since 2006.

As you know, I spent time in September visiting our principal immigration source countries—India, China, and the Philippines—as well as having discussions with my colleagues in Europe and Australia. We focused on working together to combat abuse of our immigration system, and human smuggling and trafficking.

We are taking steps to address this challenge. Regulatory changes have been introduced to clarify the authority of the government to refuse applicants on the basis of marriages of convenience. The changes provide visa officers with a better tool to prevent people who have entered into phony marriages from undermining the integrity of our system.

This fall I also held a series of cross-country town hall meetings on the issue of phony marriages. I want to personally hear people's stories, as well as their opinions and ideas about how to best address the issue. While we obviously want to keep the doors open for legitimate spouses, we also want to make sure the doors are not open for those who would break our laws and exploit Canadians.

Mr. Chair, in closing, let me just address human smuggling. This represents an assault on our country's borders and generosity. It clogs our immigration system by diverting resources away from other areas where they ought to be focused. That's why our law enforcement agencies need the tools to be able to combat human smuggling, whether on a small or large scale. Bill C-49, an act Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System, will enable us to crack down on the despicable human smugglers who prey on vulnerable migrants.

Canadians expect strong actions, but actions that are also balanced with our humanitarian and legal obligations. We believe Bill C-49 achieves that objective.

In closing, these are just some of the ways we are working to make immigration more responsive to our economy, and make our refugee programs more fair and efficient.

Thank you for this opportunity to address the Committee, and I would be happy to respond to your questions.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

I want to follow up a little bit on your commitment from 2009, in terms of offering protection to more than 22,000 refugees here, including more than 12,000 who've resettled from abroad. One of the things we did as a government, and it was supported in the House by all opposition parties, was pass Bill C-11, which committed to an additional 2,500 refugees on a yearly basis to our current obligations to the UN.

I do want to get an understanding of this because I think it needs to be clarified. Those refugees, whether they be Bhutanese or whether they be Iraqi, are in fact already approved and it's been indicated, from a UN perspective and from a worldwide perspective, that they are true refugees.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, certainly Bill C-49, our tough legislation to prevent human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system, gives us the tools we need to stop illegal smuggling boats. Longer detention will keep our streets safer. Preventing illegal immigrants from obtaining sponsoring relatives for five years reduces the incentive to queue jump. Finally, we will have the tools under our criminal law to pursue and punish the captain and crew.

We did it with Bill C-11, refugee reform legislation. We did it with Bill C-35, dealing with crooked immigration consultants. Let us work together to get this bill through the House.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chairman. I'll pick up on Mr. Marston's questions and comments with Madame Desloges.

There's also another way: those who are highly skilled or who have technical skills that are on a list of what we're looking for to build our economy can apply and be fast-tracked through the immigration process rather than come through the refugee process. There's that avenue too.

I should say right from the beginning, for full disclosure, that I know Madame Desloges quite well. I've been an admirer of her great work, and we've had the opportunity to work together. One of our mutual pursuits was the expansion of the private sponsorship of refugees program in order to get the numbers to a place that would allow us to welcome more people here.

This is one of the areas that's tough in that sense. I was just going to mention.... Chantal, you mentioned Iraq and Afghanistan. Some other countries that come to my mind are Sudan, Myanmar, and Iran--particularly Iran, as far as the gay-lesbian-bisexual-transgender community is concerned--where there is a huge need similar to the need we're talking about right now. Our capacity to absorb is one of the challenges we face. We're a country that takes a lot of refugees per capita.

You mentioned the visa office, but in the case of private sponsorship there's also the capacity to process them by having families or groups of people who will look after them and settle them here as well. That is a major challenge. I appreciate some of the comments you've made about some ideas.

Because you commented on some other legislation, I wanted to ask you about Bill C-11. That bill, the refugee reform act, was passed and has received royal assent, but it's not in place now. Did that move the ball along the field, so to speak, in terms of making it easier for inland refugees?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, the last thing this government has been is soft on our views on immigration.

We have welcomed more Canadians to this country from other lands than ever before in the history of Canada. Landing fees were cut in half as soon as this government was elected. We just passed Bill C-11, refugee reform legislation, which is some of the best legislation this country has ever seen.

When it comes to people wanting to come to this country, our doors are open. We want to see more immigration.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I do agree there was consensus at the end of our last meeting in an attempt to try to work toward a compromise that would satisfy all parties sitting at the table here. Certainly over the last 48 hours there was a strong attempt to do that--in fact a number of attempts to do that. I think we have come a significant way with regard to finding a compromise regarding this amendment, albeit of the three parties that were discussing a potential compromise, the result is that only two of the parties in those discussions were able to come to a compromise.

I certainly want to thank Mr. St-Cyr for his thoughtfulness on this in terms of trying to find a way to come to a conclusion that would see us in the same position as Bill C-11. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to move that far. The government does have to draw the line on how far it can go, at least with respect to this amendment.

I think we have come to a very reasonable approach and compromise on this, and if this amendment is defeated, I will be introducing a government amendment. In addition, I'll be reading into the record a letter that the minister will be sending to the chair of the regulatory board in terms of direction with respect to the issue we have discussed in amendment G-2.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I have a few more points to make.

The amendment, at least the way it's drafted, would also remove the minister's authority to designate a body. We would actually have to move an amendment to this to allow the minister the ability to revoke a designation.

I do have an alternative approach to this. I understand where Mr. St-Cyr is coming from. He may not be satisfied with the alternative approach, but I think it is one that is reasonable and that certainly gets to the intent of his amendment. It also has stronger support from the Government of Quebec. They have informed us that they do not see the need for such an amendment, that it's actually not necessary.

The minister mentioned at his appearance here a couple of weeks ago that the intention of Bill C-35 was to designate one body. Nothing in the bill limits designation to only one governing body, so it does allow for that provision.

I can't stress strongly enough that it's the federal government—and Ms. Ménard laid out a Supreme Court decision on this—that maintains responsibility for its legislation. If we were to pass this amendment we would be relinquishing that responsibility.

We have worked extremely well together on bills like Bill C-11 and we want to try to find a way to compromise and meet the objectives of the bill while still having a bill that meets federal requirements. This amendment simply shoots a hole in that strategy, and in fact it is the one amendment that would obviously have to go back to cabinet for approval. This is one area around where there is a huge question mark as to whether it would survive that.

So, Mr. St-Cyr, if it is the intention of the Bloc to pass this amendment and if it is the will of the committee, we're going to need the support of somebody on the other side of the table, as we only have five votes on this side. I can tell you that it is not going to meet with the approval of the government.

I'm asking the committee to consider an alternative amendment that would get at what Mr. St-Cyr is presenting but do so in a way that actually allows us, as the federal government and legislators, to maintain our federal responsibility for legislation.

Thank you.

Copyright Modernization Act

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, our critic, the member for Timmins—James Bay, explained this very well in his speech. In fact, artist compensation is a very important component of this whole equation. He took considerable time this morning to explain how, as technology changed, people in the country were alarmed that a certain business model was coming to an end, but the companies adapted.

Years ago the Pony Express delivered mail across the United States. When the telegraph came in that put it out of business. When the telephone came in it replaced the telegraph. The one constant is that technology will change and we need to adapt to the new technology.

The key is to not tie ourselves up in litigation by bringing in legislation that will involve all sorts of lawsuits and lawyers. The idea here is to facilitate commerce so that the public is well served, but the artists get their fair share of compensation as well. That is the whole idea behind having a workable piece of legislation in this country. I think we can do it if there is a will on the part of all parties to work together on this when it gets to committee. I know the Bloc has some serious issues and I do not know whether they can be resolved. Even In our case I do not whether we will get all of our issues resolved

. However, if we are positive about this and move forward, hopefully we can follow what we did with Bill C-11, the immigration legislation, and get a successful conclusion.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-32. I listened to a lot of very good presentations today regarding this very important bill.

At the outset I would like to say, following up on the previous member who spoke and the NDP critic who spoke to the bill this morning, that members of the NDP will certainly be supporting this bill going to committee. We support it in principle. It is a outstanding issue that has to be dealt with by Parliament.

In many ways, I hope it follows the route of Bill C-11, the immigration bill, which basically proved to be successful at the end of the day with the help of all four parties in the House. We have the potential to follow that route with this bill. Some of the concerns that were raised today by the NDP critic in debate were responded to by the minister of the government.

It appears to me that there certainly seems to be an interest on the government's part in working with the NDP critic and our party, and I believe, the other parties as well, to try to work out perhaps even an all-party agreement on this legislation. I really do not feel that we are that far apart.

Speaker after speaker has concentrated on really, more or less, the same issues. Some issues were not addressed, but by and large, the same issues came up over and over again. So it is incumbent upon the government in committee to resolve those issues, and perhaps before Christmas, Parliament will have a second successful bill as opposed to having it end up not going anywhere.

The government has certainly had ample experience over the last five years with bills it proposed going nowhere because it is in a minority situation and knows that all it takes is for it to bring forward a bill that the opposition does not agree with and the bill will not be successful. That is really the end of its effort.

I recognize that we have only 20 minutes to discuss this matter and I do not know that it will be sufficient. Nevertheless I want to deal with some of the issues involving Bill C-32.

Canada's technological community has long been calling for a major overhaul of the Copyright Act to bring fair and balanced copyright legislation to this country. The act has not been reviewed since 1997. I think back to those days 13 years ago and realize how the technologies have changed during that period. It is tremendous.

John Manley was the minister and Jean Chrétien was the prime minister in a majority government. How and why the Liberal government of the day, a sort of command style government with an absolute majority, could not get this job done seems a bit surprising to me. Nevertheless it did not do it. That might be indicative of how controversial it actually is and how many players are involved.

I recall a number of years ago, in 2000, when I was involved in putting together Bill 31 in Manitoba, the province's Electronic Commerce and Information Act. That was internal to the government. We had to sit down with four or five government departments that were dealing with electronic issues. The Uniform Law Conference had a template that we could follow. Just trying to get those silos, those departments within a provincial government, onside proved to be fairly difficult, although we did get the job done.

In this case, it goes way beyond the government, because we are dealing with many competing forces within the country itself. The Liberal critic pointed out this morning how substantial this area is in Canada in terms of jobs and employment and the large part of the economy that is involved.

The Conservatives' copyright modernization act seeks to enact long overdue changes that would bring Canada in line with advances in technology and current international standards. At the rate we are going and with the technology changing, we are never going to catch up unless we get this job done now.

The issue is highly complex. It features competing demands from stakeholders and the artistic, academic, business, technology, consumer rights and communities. We have heard conflicting views from a number of them even today. However, it is a top priority and a multi-faceted issue that the government must take on if it wants Canada to be a competitive player in our increasingly technology-reliant world.

When Canada signed onto the World Intellectual Property Organization, or WIPO, Internet treaties in 1997, 13 years ago, it committed then to modernize its copyright legislation. Before Bill C-32, two other attempts were made to enact legislation that would achieve the goal, most notably in 2008 when the Conservative government brought forward Bill C-61 and that bill was met with widespread opposition. It died when Parliament prorogued in 2008.

Bill C-32 is designed to be technology neutral, which is a very good way to deal with it, because if we do not do that we will be dealing with technology referencing typewriters or old technology from many years past. Taken forward to the future, 20 years from now people will not be understanding the type of technology that we are dealing with in the bill right now. So we have gone to a technology-neutral position that applies across a broad range of devices and technologies with a view of ensuring adaptability to a constantly evolving technology environment.

During the summer of 2009, as the minister referenced, Industry Canada held a series of nationwide consultations on copyrights, soliciting input from Canadian consumers, industry experts and content developers. During the consultations, the most discussed and most contentious issue was digital rights management, including the digital locks, which has been talked about by many speakers today, anti-circumvention measures and TPMs, or technological protection measures.

User rights advocates made it clear that they wanted to see the government expand the fair dealing provisions in the Copyright Act and provide more exceptions for consumers. In Canada, fair dealing as defined by the Copyright Act is more restrictive than the fair use provisions in the United States, particularly with regard to education and teaching. It refers to uses of content that are considered valid defences to copyright infringement, such as for purposes of criticism and review, news reporting or educational use.

While user rights appear to have been taken into some consideration in drafting the bill, Bill C-32 is fairly heavily weighted in favour of the rights of content owners. I reference Sony, Hollywood studios and so on and have asked the question about the influence of the Hollywood lobby, the American political lobby on the Canadian government to come up with a solution that they basically approve of.

The Conservatives laugh and say it has taken six years and obviously they are not responding to any pressure because had they responded to pressure they would have done this a long time ago. What matters here is that the American government and American business interests want to see a piece of legislation that fits in with their legislation, because they see this as a continental market. I have explained before that of the 88 countries that have approved the WIPO Internet agreements, only half of them follow the American model. The other half have a lesser approach than the American system of supporting digital locks.

The government tries to bamboozle us by telling us that we have to give industry the digital lock provisions because we are following the United States, following WIPO.

However, half the countries that have approved and ratified these agreements are not following the digital lock procedures the way the Americans are. Let us understand that from the beginning. We do not have to go holus-bolus, cap in hand, following on the trail of the Americans, contrary to what the government would like us to believe.

The government has stated that its aim in updating the Copyright Act is not to punish individual users, but rather to focus its deterrence and enforcement efforts on distributors and large websites that illegally host copyrighted content. Of course we agree with that. No party in this House wants to be causing grief to the citizens of Canada. There is no question about that at all.

The copyright modernization bill contains three broad categories of changes that Internet and e-commerce law expert Michael Geist termed sector-specific reforms, compromise provisions, and no-compromise rules regarding the DRMs.

The sector-specific reforms are designed to appeal to a wide cross-section of Canadians and include measures that extend the term of copyright for performers and producers to 50 years from the time of publication of a musical performance. They also create a new "making available" right in accordance with the WIPO treaties. This measure will give copyright owners exclusive control over how their content is made available on the Internet.

It also introduces a mandatory review of the Copyright Act, to take place every five years. It is important to have a mandatory review every five years. Even though the bill itself is technologically neutral, things may change in five years, and it is important that we have the ability to require the government to do a review after that point.

Bill C-32's compromise provisions will formally enshrine commonplace grey-area practices that enable users to record TV programs for later viewing, as long as they do not compile a library of recorded content. That is called time-shifting. I know that some people are not going to be happy with this. There are people who like to use their PVRs to copy programs and want to be able to make copies of those and record them. But they are not going to allow people to compile a library of recorded content.

The provisions regarding transferring songs from CDs to MP3 players, called format-shifting, and making backup copies create new limited exceptions to the fair- dealing provision of the Copyright Act. These include exceptions for educators and exceptions for parody and satire, which Canadian artists have been asking for. Bill C-32's compromise provisions will create an exception for content creators that would enable the circumvention of DRMs for the express purpose of reverse engineering for encryption research, security testing, perceptual disability, and software interoperability.

It would also introduce a new YouTube exception that would allow Canadian users to compile clips of copyrighted works into a remix work, as long as it is not created for commercial purposes.

I also want to point out that no one here today has mentioned that this legislation will also give photographers, for the first time, the same rights as other creators. I listened for that all day long and I did not hear anyone mention it. Photographers should be happy, because for the very first time in the history in Canada they will be given the same rights as other creators.

Bill C-32 also creates a new exception for broadcasters to allow them to copy music for their operations.

In addition, it creates a carve-out for network locks on cellphones. This is another one that I think is going to be popular. One of our members actually introduced a bill regarding cellphones, but understand that we are talking about network locks on cellphones. Right now we are stuck with a network when we buy a cellphone. The locks are going to be taken away, and Canadians are going to have the right to unlock their phones. I think people are going to be happy with that if they want to switch carriers, as long as they abide by the providers' contract terms when they make the switch.

There is also a reduction of statutory damages from a maximum fine of $20,000 per copyrighted work to a one-time maximum penalty of $5,000 in situations where copyrighted works have been illegally accessed for non-commercial purposes.

The government touts this reduction of penalties as a progressive, positive change. However, if we read Michael Geist's work, he argues that this is not going to be the effect, that it is not going to work, that we are creating legislation that is going to produce a lot of litigation.

Our critic mentioned that artists have better things to do with their time than hire lawyers. Therefore, the bill is going to be good for lawyers. But if we are talking about little artists who are trying to practise their trade, the last thing they are going to want to do is hire lawyers to track down people who are infringing on their copyrights.

Perhaps we have to take another look at the whole issue of the fines. Perhaps we ought not to think that, because we are reducing fines from $20,000 to $5,000, we have solved the problem. Michael Geist, who is a recognized expert in this area, has made a convincing argument that this is not the case.

Finally, the copyright modernization act contains no-compromise provisions that are likely to have a huge impact on the way Canadians obtain, use, and share copyrighted content. These include measures that create powerful new anti-circumvention rights for content owners like Sony and other big companies, as distinct from the creators and the developers, that prevent access to copyrighted works on pain of fines of up to $1 million, or five years in jail. This measure is based directly on the United States' controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the DMCA, and that is one of our criticisms of the bill. The government is slavishly following the American model as opposed to following the 88 countries in the world that are not following the American model, that have separated from the American model, and have gone easier on the digital lock issue.

An immediate result of this provision would be to convince the United States, and particularly its powerful entertainment lobby, that this country is in line with U.S. regulations and is an attractive and secure place to conduct business.

I think that is what it is all about with the Conservative government. It wants to convince the Americans that we are a good, safe market, with the same standards that they have, so that they can come and do business with us. Instead of this, the government should be looking out for our citizens.

The foundational principle of the new bill remains that any time a digital lock is used, whether on books, movies, music, or electronic devices, the lock trumps all rights. So what is the point of giving people all these rights if we simply take them away by making sure that the digital lock trumps all these new rights?

This means that both the existing fair-dealing rights and Bill C-32's new rights all cease to function effectively so long as rights-holders place a digital lock on their content or device. It would also require that, where a digital lock exists, digital copies made for the purposes of self-study self-destruct within five days, and that course materials be destroyed no later than 30 days after the conclusion of a course. What good is that?

We have had speaker after speaker criticize that provision of the bill.

Perhaps I can deal with the remaining points in the question-and-comments period.

Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I repeat, we know that Canadians are smart. We know that they are compassionate. We know that they want to understand these issues and they want to be led with a sense of hopefulness and a sense that we will effectively deal with the problems in the world and compassionately deal with those who are the victims. That is what Canadians are about. They are not led by slogans. They are not led by easy answers. They are not led by someone who promises them something and delivers nothing.

We have problems in our refugee system, in our immigration system. Read the Auditor General's report. There are problems in the immigration system that is being led by the government. We were trying to fix the refugee determination system with Bill C-11, an honest attempt from all sides of the House to fix that. We are attempting to do that. We also are calling upon the government to look at our international relationships, to actually build them and build the kind of world where we stop the need for a refugee determination system here.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege to speak today to this bill at second reading.

The concerns of Canadians have been well expressed by members of the Conservative government. They have echoed the concerns that I have heard from many people in my riding and across the country as people have raised concerns about people arriving on Canada's shores in very vulnerable conditions.

Obviously the arrival this summer of the Sun Sea, carrying almost 500 Tamil refugee claimants from Sri Lanka, raised concerns. It raised concerns across the political spectrum. Those on the more left side of spectrum felt that someone was taking advantage of refugee claimants by charging exorbitant amounts of money and placing their very lives in danger for a second or third time as they were placed on vessels that were not seaworthy. They were designed to actually travel between Sri Lanka and India but made an across-the-ocean voyage to Canada.

There was also a concern that this was the second ship. The previous ship, the Ocean Lady, also came to the shores of Canada with refugee claimants on it. That began to raise concerns in Canada that something was going wrong, that something was out of control.

I congratulate the government for resisting some of the urges that some Canadians had to actually stop the ships mid-course in the ocean. The government made a wise decision, actually followed the law on this and exercised great concern for the administration of justice and for the law.

However, that began a discussion around the sort of law that Canadians wanted. Canadians were expressing concern, even outrage and, at times, misunderstanding about what was going on. There was a misunderstanding about immigration versus refugee law. I know that all hon. members in this chamber know that there is a difference between immigrants and refugees and that there is a further difference between refugee claimants and refugees themselves, or convention refugees as declared. That discussion has been sort of muddied by government ministers who have taken the opportunities, perhaps unwittingly, to muddy the waters for Canadians. I wanted to spend a few minutes clarifying what we are talking about here.

First, we are talking about people who are not immigrants, who have not stood in queues up to six or seven years, as people who have come to Canada often have, and who are not coming for economic reasons or as part of family sponsorship or family reunification programs. These are also not convention refugees who have been sponsored by the government, by the church or by other groups into Canada. We know that.

These are vulnerable individuals whose lives may have been at risk and who are seeking asylum in a country that has honoured asylum seekers with fair and just processes for decades. That is who these people are.

We all know that Sri Lanka has come through over two decades of civil war that has had atrocities on all sides. After every war, there are people whose lives continue to be at risk and some of them take desperate measures. That is what has happened with the two most recent vessels. They have been loaded with people who have claimed that their lives are in danger and they are seeking asylum in Canada.

Canada has a long history of having signed onto international conventions and treaties that dictate how we will deal with those asylum seekers. They are given fair and transparent judicial processes. They are allowed to be heard on a case-by-case refugee determination process.

As the hon. member from the New Democrat caucus said earlier, we have a process whereby the refugee determination has been too slow in the past but we were able to reach an accord in this House called Bill C-11 which changes some of those refugee determination processes and are meant to speed them up.

My fear is that we already have the Minister of Public Safety expressing a lack of confidence in the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism and his fine work on Bill C-11. We on this side of the House were kind of confused when we listened to the discussions on what sort of a law would deal with this problem of smugglers.

Let there be no doubt that no one on this side of the House, nor, I believe, on the other side of the House, condones human smuggling. I will give everyone the benefit of the doubt. I do not believe anyone wants to put a vulnerable person at a greater vulnerable level. We do not want people making money off this exercise. We do not want to risk lives a second or third time. We want to ensure a fair and just immigration system, including a refugee determination system, that works. Everyone in the House agrees on that.

However, the Minister of Public Safety, who presented this legislation that does not seem to honour those things which we as Canadians have stood up for decades for, has started to shift the language on this. We hear members, although I think they are making an honest mistake, talking about queue-jumping. There are no quotas and no queues when it comes to refugee determination. We have no standards that we follow.

As a western country and as a democracy, we believe in the rule of law. Every person who comes to this country, whether by car, by foot, by canoe, by sea vessel, by airplane, by helicopter, no matter how they arrive or in what numbers they arrive, one, two or three people, whether they are children, youth, adults or seniors, every person is allowed a fair refugee determination process.

Is that system working? Obviously it is not. We introduced Bill C-11 because there were problems and it was taking too long. However, I believe some of those problems came from the fact that the government strangled the system by starving it of resources. The previous Liberal government left 15,000 people in that system and that number has now gone up to 60,000 people. This is a problem. We are hoping that Bill C-11 and the attendant resources that are required will streamline the process to ensure fairness and transparency and ensure those who are not bona fide refugees are sent home in a timely manner. We agree with that.

On this side of the House, we do not believe there are two kinds of Canadians: new Canadians and old Canadians. We are not surprised, as I keep hearing from my hon. colleagues across the aisle, that new Canadians have this concern too. We are all Canadians, whether we have been here one generation, two generations or three generations. We want to ensure that the system of justice, the system of refugee determination and the immigration system are fair, transparent and just, and we will work for that.

This particular legislation does raise some concerns for me in very specific ways. We absolutely want to tackle the problem of human smuggling. Would this bill actually do that or are there already, as previous members have said, pieces of legislation in place with life sentences if someone is actually caught doing this? Is there anything new in this legislation that would actually ensure that those who are committing the heinous act of smuggling human beings for profit into this country will be caught and punished? It is simply not in this legislation. There are too many problems.

Bill C-49 is not an effective piece of legislation nor is it a good piece of legislation. The government will need to find ways to improve this legislation to ensure that it actually addresses the real problem of human smuggling.

This bill would actually punish refugee claimants even after they have gone through a process of determination. It would create two kinds of refugees by splitting them into two classes, which is simply not right. We do not do that in Canada.

The government thinks that by somehow deterring refugees from seeking a safe way out of their country, they will not try to do this. Every piece of research has said that the laws of the land that people are going to do not determine whether or not they will try to get there. They are simply trying to get away from the threat against their life. That is the problem with this legislation. It is as though the government thinks, for example, that the Tamils living in Sri Lanka will look at this and decide not to get on the ship because of the things that could possibly happen to them.

Whatever can happen in Canada will never be as bad as what goes on for them in camps, in bushes, on beaches and in places where they try to eke out their very survival. Nothing that we can do will stop them from trying to get to safety. That is the human instinct. That is what is in the core of our bodies, our spirits. It is in our DNA. We want to survive.

That means for this to be effective, we have to do two or three different things. We have to look at truly effective ways to stop the smugglers. Yes, we want strong deterrents against the smugglers. Yes, we want to be assured that smugglers will face at least mandatory minimum sentences, with which I do not normally agree. However, this is such a horrible crime that we should look at that. Let us open our door to dealing with smugglers that way.

However, we have to go to the source of the problem. Once we have dealt with that, we have to look at human beings as human beings. The reality is these vulnerable human beings are vulnerable because of the failures of a particular national government or because of the international community's misunderstanding or failure to act to protect them.

The war has ended in Sri Lanka, but the violence and danger continues. The lives of people continue to be at risk. Canada is failing, the government is failing to ensure that we are in Sri Lanka, offering a democratic, institutional way of responding to how to live with a linguistic and religious minority in their midst and how to build civil society to protect minorities. Canada has not done that. We have abdicated our responsibility internationally.

We have also failed to work with the United Nations and other countries in refugee determination in Sri Lanka, in Thailand and in places where Tamils have sought refuge. We have to ensure that the United Nations has the resources, the staff, the personnel and the ability to get into a country and ensure that refugees are determined there.

Therefore, we have to stop the problem at the source. We have to stop it by building international human rights, by working co-operatively with other countries, by engaging internationally, by restoring our reputation, which has been so greatly damaged in the last four years by the government. We have to find a way to involve ourselves in these countries in real and meaningful ways and stop our tokenism.

The second thing we have to do is beef up the United Nations to ensure that we work in a partnership to do refugee determination there.

There are 43 million forcibly displaced persons in the world, and it is a horrible life. People seeking asylum are potential victims. They are not worthy of being further victimized in any way, as I believe the legislation may be doing. We have to find a way to fix this. We have to take out some of the basic problems in the legislation.

The question I continue to have is on these so-called irregular events. On some kind of an irregular immigration of inter-migration event, the minister seems to have too much power to designate. It seems to be far too open and far too flexible. This is one of the things at which the House has to look. We have to understand where we are then from that point on discriminating and causing two classes of refugee claimants and then, further, once determined, two classes of refugees. This law cannot discriminate against people because of where they have come from or how they have come to Canada. We have to absolutely take a step back and take a second look at the legislation.

Arbitrary detention, as the hon. member had said earlier, has not worked in Australia. Not only has civil society risen up against it, but every group that looks at this problem says that it is not working. It is not a deterrent. It is simply an infringement upon human rights.

Bill C-49 makes no exceptions for women who may be pregnant or children who arrive on the shores of our land. We have to look at this as a protection for the most vulnerable, including women and children.

The Supreme Court of Canada said that we would have to review lengthy periods of detention under the charter. Bill C-49 has to deal exactly with that. Arbitrary detention is already prohibited under international law, notably by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

Bill C-49 is dangerously close to denying any right of equal access to justice. It is blocking a sense of integration as well. That is where I really want to go in these last few minutes.

Once refugees have been determined to be refugees, they then become part of Canadian society. They are landed here and they begin to integrate into our society. They begin to learn the language and seek employment. They build families, they are part of neighbourhoods and they are part of communities. They are our friends. They are part of the structure and the very fabric of Canada.

Bill C-49 breaks that down. It blocks family reunification. It denies the right to travel. It does not look at the fact that the world changes. Someone may be determined a refugee, but that country's regime may change drastically and the conditions in that country may change.The legislation does not give the required flexibility to ensure that the people who integrate into our society are part of who we are, part of where we need to go, part of what we need to do.

The mere suspicion that something is wrong is not good enough for a minister to deny human rights. A fair and just country is what we are building. It is what we continue to work on and all legislation needs to be examined from that vantage point. Who is being hurt? Who is being helped? How is our country being built?

This legislation seems shy on actually dealing with the problem of human smuggling and heavy-handed when it comes to the victims of those smugglers. This is no time for Canada to re-victimize vulnerable people. This is no time for Canada to create two classes of refugees. This is no time for Canada to break Canada apart into different kinds of people. A Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian. A refugee is a refugee is a refugee. A claimant is a claimant is a claimant. Canada is built on that. It is built on the rule of law that ensures that justice and transparency are built into the fabric of every piece of law that we pass in the House.

Canada has made mistakes when boats have landed on our shores before. I hope I do not need to remind a single person in the House of 1939 when the Government of Canada made a mistake. We turned back the S.S. St. Louis and we let hundreds of people go back to a country where their lives were very much at risk and their safety was at stake. This was not the first time it had happened.

In 1939 the S.S. St. Louis, filled with hundreds of refugees fleeing from the Nazis, sought asylum in Canada. At that time, the government sought to discredit them as well and warned that if the S.S. St. Louis were permitted to dock, more Jews in Europe might follow. Would that they had. Would that we had opened up our eyes, our minds and our hearts because we could have saved more lives.

We had not learned the lesson in 1914 from the Komagata Maru. We did not learn it in 1939. We are learning slowly. This legislation dangerously turns back the clock on these issues.

Canada needs to remember that we are a place of justice and fairness. We will punish the smugglers strongly. We will learn to accept the refugee claimants and give them justice.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we are listening to Canadians.

Canadians told us they wanted to make this minority government work. The minority government surely is not listening to what Canadians want.

We have agreed with all the parties in this House to pass Bill C-11, which cleans up the problems in the immigration system right now. We have already indicated that we want to do something about smugglers, and there are already life sentences under current laws for smugglers.

Let us get the government out there and catch the smugglers first and give them their life sentences. We are right behind any initiative to do that.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I invite the member to read the minister's speech on this subject. I thought I heard him say that they knew where the smugglers were or who the smugglers were, that there were three or four organized criminal gangs from Sri Lanka that had been involved in the drug trade and in arms deals and whatnot in the past, and now that the war has more or less come to and end they have decided to embark on human smuggling. So if they know who the people are, it should be a simple matter of having our police forces, and so on, talk to the foreign governments and try to do something about it from that end.

Clearly, the problem is over there. That is where the boats are being bought. That is where the boats are. They are recruiting the people over there. The money is being flushed through bank accounts in these foreign countries. So it is incumbent upon these countries to help us catch these smugglers. The government itself has indicated that it is going to appoint a special adviser on human smuggling and it is going to increase the presence overseas through operational activities, diplomatic outreach, partnership with other affected nations, and all those other great things that would catch these smugglers. So I invite them to get out there and catch them.

In the meantime, we have Bill C-11, which we put together through a co-operation of all of the parties in this House. Let us get it implemented and let us deal with the backlog in the immigration system.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to Bill C-49 today.

During question period today, the member for Winnipeg South Centre asked a question about the nominee program in Manitoba. This has been a very successful program, developed under the auspices of the NDP under former premier Gary Doer's leadership in 1999. In fact, the program became so successful that the province of Nova Scotia approached Manitoba to study how to replicate it. I hope and believe Nova Scotia has a similarly successful program at this time.

In answering the question, the minister made the point that Manitoba's population represented 10% of the population of Canada and that Manitoba received 30% of the nominees under the program. He pointed out that while the Liberals were in power, Manitoba only received 2,000 nominees per year. Under the Conservatives, it gets 10,000 per year. We like to think that the 10,000 we get in Manitoba each year is a result of the initiatives of the Gary Doer NDP government, which proved to be so successful.

I also want to point out that the Minister of Immigration has provided some of the only true leadership we have seen from his government in the last five years. In June he brought all parties in Parliament onside with an agreement on Bill C-11 to take care of the mess in the immigration system, which had developed over the years.

The argument rages still in the House as to whether the mess was in fact left by the Liberals or created by the Conservatives. The NDP has stayed out of that fight. They can continue to fight it out as to who is ultimately responsible, but the fact is it is a mess. As I said, the minister was able to get all party agreement in June to make big improvements to the immigration system.

What the minister did is something the government should replicate. There is a schizophrenia in the government. It seems to be incapable of going back to the last long period of minority government, the Lester B. Pearson years in the sixties, when we got a new flag, we amalgamated the armed forces, we brought in medicare and a lot of other things. The Conservatives have literally wasted five full years trying to fight its way through Parliament with no real effect.

However, there is one good example with the minister getting all parties together and getting a new immigration act in place. The government should be doing more of that. Instead, what has it done? The Conservatives have done some polling, and we are very clear about that. They keep mentioning the 65% public support for Bill C-49.

The bill is not being promoted by the Minister of Immigration. It is being promoted by the Minister of Public Safety. Once again, the Minister of Public Safety trumps the Minister of Immigration and the polling of the Conservative Party. The appeal to public sentiment is the overriding concern behind this bill.

We feel we should give some time for Bill C-11 to be implemented in the country. It was only passed in June. It has not had time to do what it has been designed to do. Now the government is trying to amend the bill before it even has its current legislation in place.

It is interesting to note that Bill C-49 has 12 clauses that deal with refugees. Only five clauses actually deal with smugglers. I think all parties in the House agree that human smuggling is a very bad thing and that it is a criminal enterprise. In fact, the government points out that it is a criminal enterprise that spans the globe, that human smugglers facilitate for a profit individuals entering Canada illegally. The figure of $50,000 is being mentioned.

Our party is totally opposed to this. We think the government should take measures to root out these smugglers. We know the smugglers are not here. The smugglers are in foreign jurisdictions. Therefore, the government has to bring in legislation to deal directly with an effort to get at these people in other countries. It has indicated it is dealing with that issue through diplomatic means and policing means. It is going to have to deal with the police in Thailand, in Southeast Asia and other countries around the world.

It has also been pointed out that there already is a life sentence under the immigration laws of the country for smugglers. Therefore, what is this all about? Why is the government bringing in a new bill with a graduated penalty system and minimum sentences when we already have a life sentence for people involved in this kind of activity, if they are caught.

By charging large sums of money for transportation, human smugglers have been making a lucrative business out of facilitating illegal migration around the world, often counselling smuggled persons to claim asylum in the country in which they are smuggled. Human smuggling can take place in many forms, including by boat.

Once again, as has been pointed out by many members, the government is making a separation as to how people arrive in Canada. It will deal with people who arrive by boat differently than people who arrive by airplane.

In terms of human smuggling undermining Canada's security, large scale arrivals make it difficult to properly investigate whether those who arrive, including the smugglers themselves, could pose a risk to Canada on the basis of either criminality or national security. The public security minister made pronouncements about criminals and terrorists, speaking about the recent arrival of the boat, stirring up public sentiment against them. The people who are brought in will be investigated. That is the whole idea behind what we are doing right now.

In addition, the government wants to give the Minister of Public Safety more powers. I do not know if that is such a good idea. In the short term perhaps with the current situation it might seem like the popular thing to do, because 65% of the people are against acceptance of the people on these boats. However, if we were to take it two or three years down the line and a boat load of people from another country showed up, perhaps the polling then would show that 65% were in favour of the people staying. What is the minister going to do? What is the point of having an immigration department in the first place if the minister is going to be overriding it and making decisions along the way? That measure may be wise in the short run, but may not be wise in the long run.

The government also wants to make it easier to prosecute human smugglers, but it has to catch them in the first place and they have to be caught overseas. Foreign governments have to be involved in the process as well.

I believe the government already knows who these smugglers are. The minister has indicated there are three or four groups at least in Sri Lanka that were previously involved in other criminal activities. These groups have now transferred their activities over to human smuggling. Half the battle is knowing who the enemy is.

The bottom line is we should be enforcing our existing laws as opposed to dreaming up new laws to become more popular with the public.

The government also wants to introduce mandatory minimum prison sentences on convicted smugglers. It wants to hold the owners and operators of the ships to account for the use of their ships in human smuggling operations.

The government is ensuring the safety and security of our streets and communities by establishing, and this is a good one, the mandatory detention of participants for up to a year or until a positive decision by the Immigration and Refugee Board, whichever comes sooner, in order to allow for the determination of the identity, admissibility and illegal activity of a participant.

We have some experience with Australia. My colleague from B.C. indicated earlier that he thought there were probably 20,000 refugees in the Australian system. I recognize it is a little warmer in Australia than here, but where will Australia put these people?

The government has announced that it will spend $9 billion on new prisons in the country. Will the government use these prisons as detention centres? Is it the government's intention to put people into detention centres? That is one of the initiatives in the bill.

The government hopes to reduce the attraction of coming to Canada by way of illegal human smuggling by doing several other things. It is going to prevent those who come to Canada from applying for permanent resident status for a period of five years.

I may be running out of time quicker than I anticipated so I do not know if I will have time to get to all the studies that have been done.

Studies done in England show that most immigrants do not have a clue of the rules of the country to which they go. They go to that country regardless of the rules. Are we expecting smugglers to start reading the new rules? What is the government going to do? Is it going to send the smugglers a list of the new rules and all the regulations that are promulgated through the bill?

The government is going to hold a refugee back from permanent resident status for a period of five years should that individual successfully obtain refugee status. The individual will be prevented from sponsoring family members for five years. I will have a lot to say about that at a later point.

The government is trying to reduce the attraction of coming to Canada by way of illegal human smuggling operations by ensuring the health benefits participants receive are not more generous than those received by the Canadian public.

The government is enhancing the ability to terminate the protected person status of those who return to their country of origin for a vacation or demonstrate in other ways that they are not in legitimate need of Canadian protection.

Another point raised by other speakers was whether the bill would survive a charter challenge.

The government is planning to detect and deter human smuggling overseas through the appointment of a special adviser on human smuggling and illegal migration. That may be a good idea. I do not know who that will be and what he or she might do, but hopefully there will be a way of monitoring or getting some sort of report from this individual as to progress being made. We would not want to add onto a bureaucracy that produces very little results.

In terms of increasing the presence overseas through operational activities, diplomatic outreach, partnership with other affected nations and engagement with multilateral bodies, anything that can track down the smugglers and put them in jail is probably a good idea. I indicated that we already have life sentences for smugglers. If we apply life sentences and put them in jail, the House will have our full agreement on that, but the preponderance of the bill actually deals with the migrants themselves and that is what the government is looking at.

Bill C-49 is called the “preventing human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system act”, but it is really basically an act to attack and punish refugees. As I indicated before, we would rather attack the criminals, the traffickers, the smugglers, and not the victims. The bill will concentrate absolute power in the hands of the minister to decide which refugees will be subject to these measures, with no clear definition of irregular arrival. It can apply to any group of refugees, immigrants or visitors.

Also, as I have indicated, Parliament already approved a strong and balanced refugee law a few months ago. The Conservatives should basically concentrate on enforcing Bill C-11, the law we have right now, and allow genuine refugees to stay and deport the bogus ones as quickly as possible. We are fully in agreement with that. Once again, we were part of the development group behind Bill C-11 in the first place.

We have also long called for the refugee determination process to be sped up, because it has taken too long in the past, and increased RCMP resources and secure immigration status of trafficked and smuggled victims so that they can testify against the real criminals. That was a concern that was indicated as well, that even if we do catch the smugglers, what are the realistic chances that witnesses would be willing to testify against them? We need to make sure that we have RCMP resources and proper safeguards to make sure that when we do catch these people, the witnesses are able to testify against them to put them away for those long sentences.

Our members have indicated that the bill will hurt legitimate refugees and those people who help them. It will prevent refugees from bringing their spouses and children to Canada for at least seven years, and women and children will be detained for at least one year, repeating the previous sad history of punishing and interning refugees and their children.

Bill C-49 is basically very deeply unfair to refugees because it fails to honour obligations under Canadian and international law, and other speakers have mentioned that. It deprives individual cases from the independent review that justice requires. It will involve huge costs and unnecessary detention. We talked about the $9 billion in prisons that the government will have sprouting up across the country over the next little while. It will do nothing to prevent human smuggling. More laws will not catch the smugglers who are overseas. Mandatory minimum sentences will not deter them.

Under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, smuggling is already punishable by life imprisonment and mandatory minimums have been shown not to work as deterrents. If we already have the possibility of life imprisonment, then how much further do we want to go in this area?

I recognize that my time is up and I would be willing to answer questions from members.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is great to get back to matters of substance.

It is an honour to have the opportunity to rise today in support of Bill C-49, an act to prevent human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system.

Canada has a history and a tradition of welcoming immigrants who wish to start a new life here. On a per capita basis, we now welcome more newcomers than any other country, nearly a quarter of a million last year alone.

Through the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, introduced by our Conservative government, we have committed to resettle 2,500 more refugees living in refugee camps and urban slums. This is a source of pride for our country and a reflection of the generosity of our nation. It is part of our national character.

Unfortunately, Canada's immigration system and our generosity have become a target for human smuggling operations. The arrival of the MV Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady in a period of less than 12 months clearly demonstrated that human smuggling networks are extending their reach to our borders. Our intelligence indicates that these voyages, organized by criminal syndicates, will continue.

This form of illegal commercial migration is dangerous and exploitive by nature. The journey of these migrants is treacherous, and every year people around the world die in human smuggling operations.

The ringleaders of these smuggling operations are ruthless profiteers. They are vile, despicable criminals who consider their passengers to be little more than cargo. Those profiteers cause misery and suffering, and risk the lives of those they purport to be helping. Human smugglers and those on board their vessels also provide financial support to dangerous international criminal networks.

Many who use these types of smuggling networks are economic migrants. When they use this unlawful behaviour to arrive on our shores and then claim to be asylum seekers, they abuse our country's generosity.

These operations are unfair to those seeking to come to Canada by legal means. Millions of people around the world aspire to come to our great country, and it is gross unfairness to allow others to jump the queue through illegal means and co-opt those who use legal means to come to Canada.

Those who use illegal means take up space and resources in our immigration system, which should be focused on those who have applied to immigrate legally. They deprive true refugees of the opportunity to be granted protection in this great country of ours. When genuine refugees use these illicit networks to get to Canada, they put themselves and their families at risk.

If we do not take strong action now, more vessels will arrive in Canada and more lives will be put at risk. We cannot just stand by and allow these exploitive operations to continue. We must act now.

We must act to avoid a two-tiered immigration system: one tier for legal immigrants who wait patiently in the queue for the privilege of coming to Canada; and a second tier for illegal migrants and queue-jumpers who pay human smugglers to get them to the front of the line.

Canadians have reacted strongly to these unwelcome arrivals. More than 50% of Canadians polled agreed that this type of migration is unacceptable. These events have put at risk public support for immigration in general and refugees in particular.

We are a generous country. We welcome immigrants and refugees from around the world. I would hate to see our national support for that program decline because illegal migrants and smugglers are abusing the system.

We need to maintain public confidence in our immigration and refugee system, since immigration will soon become the source of all our labour-force growth and a critical part of our economic growth.

The legislation before us will help prevent abuse of Canada's immigration system and goodwill. It will help us prevent human smuggling operations. It will provide disincentives to would-be migrants, so that they do not place themselves at the mercy of human smugglers on these treacherous ocean journeys.

I would like to outline how this legislation will do just that. First, the law before us proposes to introduce mandatory detention for up to one year. This will allow for determination of identity, admissibility, and illegal activity. As I am sure most members of this House are aware, people who arrive on these vessels often do not have proper documentation, whether by design or not.

We do not know who they are or whether they might have been involved in criminal or terrorist activities. We as a government need to have time to confirm their identities. This becomes particularly difficult in the case of mass arrivals, as we have recently experienced, when hundreds of people arrive at the same time without the proper paperwork.

As we are now learning, some of the migrants onboard the Sun Sea have already claimed refugee status in other countries such as the United Kingdom, and have already been found not to be in need of protection.

Detention will allow us to verify and confirm the identities of these individuals. This way we can determine whether they are admissible to Canada, or whether they are, or have ever been, involved in illegal activity.

That is fair and reasonable, and Canadians agree with us. Our main priority is to protect the safety and security of Canadians. We need to know who these people are before they are released into our Canadian communities. This is the least that Canadians can expect of their government, and we are delivering on that expectation.

Second, this legislation aims to introduce several disincentives to stop those who are tempted to use this perilous form of migration. A key disincentive is that those who arrive as a result of a designated smuggling event will not be able to apply for permanent residency for a period of at least five years. This applies whether they are found to be in need of protection or not.

During that five-year period, persons found to be in need of protection would be restricted from travelling outside Canada and would be unable to apply for permanent residence to Canada through other means. As a result, they would not be eligible to sponsor family members into Canada or to become Canadian citizens during that time.

For those who received protected-person status, reporting requirements would be put in place. This will allow our government to be able to initiate proceedings before the Immigration and Refugee Board to remove their protected-person status if there is evidence that the individual no longer needs protection. This would apply, for example, if the individual returns to his country of origin or if conditions in that country change.

If someone is able to return safely from a holiday to his country of origin, the country that he claims to be fleeing, then he is clearly not in genuine need of Canada's protection. In such cases, the existing legislation would allow the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism to make an application to the Refugee Protection Division for a cessation of the individual's protected-person status.

These legislative amendments would ensure that while an individual is subject to a cessation application, his application for permanent residence would be suspended and would not be processed until a decision is made on the minister's application. If the Refugee Protection Division upholds the minister's decision and the application for cessation, the individual would be removed from Canada.

An individual would be allowed to apply for permanent residence only after five years, if he is determined to be in further need of protection. This means that people in this category could apply for permanent residence only if no cessation proceedings had been initiated as a result of changed country conditions, or if they had not returned to their country of origin, or if the minister's application for cessation was not positively decided by the IRB.

If there is evidence that the protected-person status was obtained fraudulently, if, for example, an individual has directly or indirectly misrepresented or withheld material facts relevant to his situation, then the Minister of Public Safety would be able to apply to the Refugee Protection Division of the IRB to revoke the individual's refugee protection status. If the original decision is cancelled and no other grounds for protection remain, the individual would be removed from Canada.

Once in force, the bill would also eliminate access to the Refugee Appeal Division for people who want to review a negative decision on their claim. While they would still be able to ask the Federal Court to review a decision, they would not benefit from an automatic stay of removal from Canada while their application was being considered.

These measures that our government has proposed are firm but reasonable. They are exactly what Canadians have been calling for. They would maintain our Conservative government's goal of faster protection for those who truly need it and faster removal of those who do not. This will be achieved through the balanced refugee reform act, the bill before us today.

To further discourage individuals from coming to Canada as part of a smuggling operation, we are also taking measures to ensure that these individuals have access to fewer Canadian benefits. Canadians enjoy health services that are among the best and most generous in the world.

Currently, asylum seekers, resettled refugees, failed asylum seekers awaiting removal, detained individuals, and victims of trafficking are all provided with temporary health care coverage through the interim federal health program.

Under the changes we are proposing, the scope of services provided under the IFH program would be reduced for those who arrive in Canada illegally by way of human smuggling. They would receive only basic coverage, including medically necessary care and the immigration medical exams that refugee claimants must take upon their arrival in order to ensure that they do not pose a risk to public health or safety.

We need to ensure that illegal migrants are not receiving health coverage that is more generous than that offered to hard-working Canadians.

Canada is a fair, generous and welcoming country for those who want to work for a better life, but our generosity should not make us a target for criminal activities such as smuggling operations. In order to avoid becoming a target, we must remove the incentives for people seeking to come here by way of human smuggling.

These measures before us today are right. They are fair. And they are necessary. We know that Canadians agree with us. Poll after poll shows that Canadians want firm action taken on human smuggling, on cheating the system.

Cultural groups across the country have endorsed our measures. The Peel Tamil Community Centre stated that it was “pleased to see the government taking action to deter human smugglers who charge victims enormous sums of money”. The Taiwanese Canadian Association of Toronto said, “We need to know the identities of these individuals before they are released into Canadian society. That's why we also support the mandatory detention of illegal migrants who use human smugglers”.

Our government is committed to protecting the integrity of our immigration and refugee system. We are committed to upholding our laws. We are committed to protecting the safety and security of Canadians.

Taken together, the changes we have proposed will help safeguard our fair and generous immigration system. Moreover, they will help ensure that Canada is not an easy target for criminal organizations involved in human smuggling.

As I mentioned before, this legislation has won the support of virtually all key stakeholders. The legislation has resonated with Canadians at large. In fact, recent polls show that 60% of Canadians want to send ships back without allowing them to land on our shores. Yet we know that as a compassionate country we have to leave room for legitimate refugees. It is the abuse of the system that we object to.

Canada is a compassionate country, but because we are compassionate and generous, there are people around the world who will abuse that generosity, and Canadians do not tolerate abuse. In fact, I am shocked to hear the opposition parties in this House actually criticizing and opposing this bill. It is very clear that they are still not listening to Canadians.

We have consulted broadly with Canadians on this bill and we know that Canadians support it. My invitation to the opposition parties is to join us in doing the right thing for Canada.

Preventing Human Smugglers From Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Madam Speaker, the arrival on Canadian shores of the latest two boats filled with Tamil refugee claimants has generated many concerns from the public. Opinion polls suggest that the vast majority of Canadians want future boats to be turned away and the Tamil refugee claimants to be deported for fear that our generous system is being exploited by criminal elements.

As always, the government has not missed the opportunity to turn public concerns into bad legislation that torques up the issue and promotes fear and misunderstanding in the hopes of electoral gain.

Bill C-49 is a terrible piece of legislation but a very effective announcement. It is effective because the government gets to talk about getting tough on vile human smugglers who criminally take advantage of extraordinarily vulnerable people fleeing persecution and oppression. It is always effective to be able to stand up and talk about defeating the evildoers while protecting the innocent and the just.

The problem is that is all this is, talk. This legislation actually does very little to go after the evildoers, and far from protecting the vulnerable, actually goes after and punishes asylum seekers.

Allow me to be very clear on one thing, Liberals and indeed members of all parties in this House are deeply committed and concerned with our capacity to crack down on human smugglers and protect the integrity of our refugee and immigration systems.

It is just that it is apparent there is little in the new legislation that actually cracks down on smugglers. There are provisions the government is quite pleased with that provide for mandatory minimum sentences of up to 10 years, but those are very unlikely to be an effective deterrent given that smuggling already carries a potential life sentence.

There are some minor provisions against shipowners who disobey ministerial orders, but nothing that is truly likely to put a dent in the multi-million dollar human smuggling business. Indeed, many of the provisions will just drive up the cost to asylum seekers and put them on more dangerous sea routes.

Rather, most of the legislation's provisions are directed at trying to deter refugees themselves. Many of the provisions may be inconsistent with the charter. Others are in direct violation of our obligations under international law. All will cause great hardship to refugees who have come to Canada to seek protection.

The legislation represents a complete reversal and backtracking on Canada's proud humanitarian tradition toward refugees and the displaced.

This government bill would create two classes of refugees based on the means of transportation they use to get here. Consider this: our system assesses, questions and judges people to determine whether they are legitimate refugees, but they will be treated differently if the minister does not like the way they arrived in Canada. That has nothing to do with the refugees' merit. It is entirely arbitrary. These people are recognized as refugees because they have good reason to fear for their lives because of their race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinions. These are legitimate refugees, but because we do not like the way they arrived here, we subject them to harsh punishment that is no doubt unconstitutional and certainly violates our international obligations.

We cannot judge people on the basis of how they get here, because refugees use unorthodox means to reach their chosen land. In most cases, people have found unorthodox ways to get to Canada. The government judges these people on the basis of their country of origin. Designating people who arrive illegally means the government can judge anyone it wants.

In addition to keeping designated refugees locked up, the government would impose a five-year probation, during which time they would be forbidden from leaving Canada or from applying to sponsor other family members, who are most likely suffering. The government would also have the power to hold asylum seekers for up to a year.

The president of the Canadian Council for Refugees, Wanda Yamamoto, said:

Measures keeping some refugees longer in detention, denying them family reunification and restricting their freedom of movement are likely in violation of the Canadian Charter and of international human rights obligations. People who are forced to flee for their lives need to be offered asylum and a warm welcome, not punished.

That is what is so worrisome about this capacity to create two categories of refugees depending simply on whether or not the minister approves of the way they got here.

The thinking behind it, I assume, is that if people know that the minister might not approve of their way of coming here, they are not going to get in those leaky boats and risk their lives in a heavy crossing. But when we look at the pressures on them when they got on, and their willingness to shell out to criminal elements extraordinary amounts of money that they do not have, the suspicion that perhaps the minister will disapprove of them is not going to keep them away.

When we create two classes of refugees because we like their way of getting here or we do not like their way of getting here, we are creating divisions among the very people who are most vulnerable, people whose rights Canada has sworn to uphold and protect. It is a complete discarding of the Canadian principles of fairness and justice that have defined this country for decades.

The Charter of Rights and Freedoms states that everyone has the right not to be arbitrarily detained or imprisoned. Everyone has the right on arrest or detention to be informed promptly, to retain and instruct counsel without delay, and to have the validity of the detention determined by way of habeas corpus and to be released if the detention is not lawful.

On top of that, the fact that refugees would have no right to apply for permanent residence for five years after determination of their claim is inconsistent with the principle enunciated in article 34 of the UN Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees which provides that states must make every effort to expedite naturalization proceedings for people determined to be refugees. We are tossing international obligations and Canadian law to the wind with this bill.

The Geneva Convention states:

The Contracting States shall issue to refugees lawfully staying in their territory travel documents for the purpose of travel outside their territory...

That is fairly clear. Again, the proposed legislation goes against that by banning them from travel for up to five years. Even once they have been recognized as refugees, they have to wait until they become permanent residents to get travel documents.

The Geneva Convention also states that the contracting states, of which we are one:

...shall in particular make every effort to expedite naturalization proceedings and to reduce as far as possible the charges and costs of such proceedings.

That is one of the things Amnesty International recently declared in an open letter violates the rights of these refugees. It ignores the reality that many of these refugees who have a well-founded fear of persecution turn to smugglers for assistance because of desperation, because of a lack of other options, because of a lack of a willingness of their host government which is busy oppressing or maligning them to help them get to another country.

Neither a just society, nor the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, nor international agreements are safe from this government.

We have good reason to be very concerned about this bill. I—we—understand that the problem of human trafficking needs to be dealt with, but the Conservatives' approach lacks refinement, subtlety and respect for the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. They are classifying people not according to the dangers they face at home, but according to how they get to Canada. That is not the right way to do things.

The Tamil boatloads of 2009 and 2010 represented a new wave of boatloads of refugee claimants. The government's response to the first boat was relatively muted. There was not a tremendously strong public outcry against these refugee claimants.

However, well before the second boatload arrived, the public safety minister was already warning the Canadian public that the boat was filled with terrorists and criminals, before these people were evaluated, examined, interviewed, judged on their individual merits, as our obligations require us to do in the case of every single refugee.

This coming out against them soured public opinion against the claimants before they even arrived in Canada, and has produced a dramatic backlash. The effect of this short-sighted reaction has been to create a strong anti-refugee and anti-immigrant sentiment.

That is not typical of Canada. That is not typical of Canadians. We are a country that has consistently stood up open to immigrants, to refugees, and to drawing from around the world people who wish to come here, build a safe and secure life free from persecution. Now we are busy encouraging that persecution and hyping up the tensions between Canadians and potentially new Canadians.

It is extremely important that a Canadian government be responsible in how it defends our immigration and refugee system, how it makes Canadians understand that we are strong because of, not in spite of, diversity. Our differences are what define us and make us the flexible, open, confident, powerful country that we are in the process of becoming more and more every day.

The government needs to be much more responsible in how it chooses to elevate and enervate the Canadian public's level of debate on an issue such as this one.

It is important to mention that when the minister and the Prime Minister talk about making sure that the immigrants who go through the normal process do not get unfair treatment because of the queue jumpers, it is actual misinformation.

Let me share a secret that the government does not want anyone to know. There is no queue for refugees. There are no queue jumpers in the refugee system. We have a process around refugees. Anyone who comes to Canada and seeks asylum falls into an evaluation process that has nothing to do with the quotas we establish for refugees, family class immigrants, economic migrants. It has nothing to do with the legitimate immigration process, the queue and wait times.

A refugee is evaluated on the merits of his or her individual case. Unfortunately, as we have seen in the case of the American war deserters and many others, the government is choosing to interfere with the process in which refugee claimants are evaluated on the merits of their claim. The government is choosing to prejudge. It is choosing to frame the debate in such a way that people are blending immigrants and refugees. They are two very different things.

By stoking our fears and concerns and the frustrations of legitimate immigrants who have been here but who followed the queue, who see these people as queue jumpers because the government says they are queue jumpers, we are not serving Canada. We are not living up to our international responsibilities to be a fair and just country. We are falling by the wayside of the rights and principles for which Canada has always stood.

Instead of misinforming and holding press conferences in front of boats, we would have liked the government to consider an alternative approach.

The first and most obvious one, in the case of the Sri Lankan asylum seekers, is to aggressively pursue a peace settlement in Sri Lanka.

Tens of thousands of Tamils still remain detained in detention camps. The government is being investigated by the United Nations to see if crimes against humanity were committed by the government during the civil war. Tortures and disappearances unfortunately continue.

However, there is no doubt that there is a genuine opportunity for peace. The Tamil minority wants some form of autonomy. This can be addressed within a federal state. More and more Tamils are involved in the Sri Lankan government. There is an openness toward improving the relations between the Tamil community, the international community and the government.

We are making headway on that and Canada can play a role in helping shape that peace, in helping encourage that peace. We know what it is like to live within a country where there are distinct cultural, linguistic and religious identities and to make it work. We are living proof of that here in the House of Commons. We need to build on our capacity to work with international partners, to work with the UN. Unfortunately it is an area in which the government has not been particularly successful.

When we called upon the government to work with international partners, to cut off human smuggling, to decrease the likelihood and the possibility of engaging with human smugglers, to go after human smugglers, what did it do? The Conservatives went after them. They worked with local police forces. But instead of rounding up human smugglers they rounded up potential asylum seekers. That is not the kind of work we need to do if we are going to really crack down on human smuggling.

People have been talking about turning around boats. I am pleased that the government has not chosen in this bill to encourage the idea that we should turn these boats around before they land on our shores, because that is a violation of any number of international conventions and puts people who are extraordinarily vulnerable at tremendous risk.

Since the diversion of the ships is not legal, the only alternative is therefore to provide expeditious determination of refugee claims. It is well known that the most effective mechanism for deterring frivolous or irresponsible or unfounded claims and slowing down refugee movements is to subject persons to fair but expeditious determinations and to quickly deport persons whose claims are rejected. Unfortunately, Bill C-49 does not address that and does not encourage that.

The process of seeking the detention of refugee claimants, coupled with expedited hearings while providing them due process is an effective response to try to deter claims. In the case of the Sri Lankan Tamils, given the current situation, it may well be that some of the claimants will be accepted. However, all should be expeditious, fair determinations.

This, coupled with efforts to resolve the situation in Sri Lanka and with efforts to stem the flow of boats by working with governments in the region, is the most effective long-term response. It can be done without inflaming anti-immigrant feelings in Canada and in a manner that will ensure Canada complies with its obligations under international law and the charter.

Speaking of this legislation, there is something else that worries me. As we have heard speaker after speaker in the opposition get up and highlight all the real legal challenges and convention challenges with this bill, and as experts have come out time and time again with real concerns about this, the thing that really bugs me is that this legislation, which is filled with ineffective and illegal measures, was drafted by the good people in what is generally considered to be the best immigration ministry in the world.

Our fine bureaucrats put together this piece of legislation that is not worthy of the kind of work and the kind of balanced approach that was even available and visible in Bill C-11 that we passed unanimously in the House. That bill was supposed to balance and improve our process of evaluating refugees and providing fairness for refugees.

Under the guise of legislation to deter smugglers, or smuggling, the government has introduced broad changes to our refugee determination system and to the rights of persons recognized as refugees.

Let us be perfectly clear. There is very little in this legislation that is designed to crack down on smugglers. Instead, this legislation takes reprisals against the refugees who use those smugglers—

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, when the hon. member referenced Bill C-11, which passed the House with the support of all parties and all members of Parliament, he referenced it in an interesting way. We worked collectively on that bill and we passed a bill that we all thought was pretty good. Were we 100% happy? No one was absolutely happy but we thought it was good.

All of sudden, this bill gets dropped on us out of the blue that seems to go back on that sort of consensual collective way that we were able to arrive at results. The result of dropping a bill without any consultation with other parties are issues that were raised.

My goodness, have we ever allowed for the incarceration of children for one year in detention centres in Canada? What are we thinking of doing here? How can we separate families for five years? The people who are determined to be refugees, we will not allow them to travel back to their country to bring to Canada the rest of their families who also are in harm's way as refugees in camps, perhaps. Even though they have been determined as refugees, we will not allow them landed status, so they cannot bring over their families.

We will have sometimes husbands, wives and children of determined refugees in harm's way. Could the hon. member tell us if Canada has ever treated some of the most vulnerable on the planet in that manner?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

It has not even been proclaimed yet, as one of my colleagues points out.

This is really problematic and a very sad day that we are here to do this.

Bill C-49 is a piece of legislation that is extremely unfair to refugees. We just listened to a speech from a Conservative member that had a completely confused understanding of what it was to be a refugee or a refugee claimant in Canada. The member seemed to believe that all of these people were criminals or potential criminals and talked about them in that way. Nothing could be further from the truth, and even in the situation where a refugee claimant may lose that determination, I would think there are very few, if any, of those people who any Canadian would reasonably define as a criminal. It is very sad that this kind of confusion can exist on the Conservative bench amongst government party members about the intent or the need for this piece of legislation. That is a very serious confusion and misleads Canadians about the situation of refugees and refugee claimants in Canada.

Even if we look at the situations that seem to have given occasion to this particular bill, the arrival of the boats on Canada's west coast with largely Tamil refugees, that is not a fair descriptor yet. Many of the people who have arrived in Canada in boats, recently and in past years, have had successful refugee determination cases. They were not criminals. They were not queue-jumpers. They were in fact refugees, as determined by the established process here in Canada. That characterization of them is false and misleading, and it is very sad that it continues to be promulgated.

Bill C-49 is a deeply flawed bill and deeply unfair to refugees. It does not honour Canada's obligations under our own equality law, under the charter, or under international law. It is a sad departure from Canada being, in 1986, a country that was honoured by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees with the Nansen Medal for its refugee work as one of the outstanding countries in the world in terms of refugee resettlement and support for refugees. This is a far step from that point in our past history.

This bill would deprive refugees of an independent review. Because it moves to the detention system, which we have largely avoided in Canadian refugee determination and Canadian refugee law, it goes to the expensive alternative of detention. Detention is hugely expensive when compared to the value of a refugee claimant living in the community while his or her case is being determined. This is a serious departure.

The reality is that the bill, despite all the bravado about it, would really not do much about human smuggling. More Canadian laws are not going to catch human smugglers, the people who organize the kinds of things that the government is apparently concerned about.

Mandatory minimum sentences are ineffectual in most criminal situations and I cannot imagine how in this circumstance there is even any hope of them being any kind of deterrence. The only reason we would have a mandatory minimum sentence is for the deterrent value. I think they are almost useless. I doubt that any of the criminal organizations that the government says are out there organizing and switching from arms shipments to human shipments are writing memos to the people they work with saying, “Beware. Canada has just introduced a mandatory minimum sentence for human smuggling”. Mandatory minimums are not going to stop any of those people. They are not even an issue. They are not even a consideration in those circumstances. In this case, a mandatory minimum sentence would be completely ineffectual. This is one of the places where it would be least effective anywhere in criminal law.

Overwhelmingly, mandatory minimum sentences are ineffective throughout most aspects of criminal law. It is a government fantasy to think that they would somehow address the human smuggling situation.

Refugees are usually people who are in desperate circumstances. One of the criteria for determining whether people are refugees is if they fear for their life in their country of origin, if they have been persecuted and are seeking safety. It is our duty to receive those people and make a determination about their case.

In Bill C-11, we made decisions about how to expedite that process. It was taking too long in some cases. The Conservatives did not help the speed of the refugee determination process by their actions when they became government, by the fact that they would not reappoint anybody to the immigration and refugee appeal boards. The backlog increased because of their refusal to reappoint anybody that the previous Liberal government had appointed. They were slow making their own appointment. The Conservatives are directly responsible for the backlog that exists in refugee determination in Canada right now.

But we did take some extra measures to make sure that it was a more effective process in Bill C-11. We did take measures to ensure that when someone is determined not to be a refugee that they are removed from Canada. I have always said that a key aspect of our immigration and refugee policy had to be an effective removals policy as well. If we are going to have any respect for our refugee and immigration regime, that has to be an effective part. There has been a real experience that it is one place where we have fallen down in terms of enforcing immigration law in the past.

I want to talk about some of the specific aspects of this legislation.

I really believe that Bill C-49 punishes refugees. My remarks are drawing fairly heavily on the work of the Canadian Council for Refugees, in whom I have incredible confidence. This is an umbrella organization of almost every refugee- and immigrant-serving organization in Canada. It does excellent and detailed work on immigration and refugee policy and speaks loud and clear for the people it serves from coast to coast to coast in Canada. Whenever I speak on immigration and refugee matters, I draw heavily on its work.

Bill C-49 has been presented as legislation that would target smugglers, but in fact most of the legislation would not target smugglers but refugees and changes the circumstance for refugees. I think the previous Liberal member did a count and said there are 12 sections of the bill that deal with refugees and only five sections that deal with smugglers. So it really is an unbalanced piece of legislation in that sense.

Refugees, in this bill, including refugee children, would be mandatorily detained for a year without the possibility of an independent review and denied family reunification and the right to travel for over five years under the terms of this legislation. These are very serious restrictions. Mandatory detention is something that we have not used extensively in Canada and I think it would be a real departure from the success of our refugee legislation.

Many people believe that under Bill C-49 refugees could easily be victimized three times: first, by the people who were persecuting them in their country of origin; second, by smugglers who are often the unscrupulous people they have to use to escape their persecution; and finally, by an unfair process here in Canada. This is totally contrary to what we should be doing. We should be seeking to reduce the victimization of refugees and of people who have been persecuted and who fear for their lives in their countries of origin. The bill would only add to that victimization, unfortunately.

As I mentioned earlier, this legislation seems to violate Canada's commitments under international law and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Convention on the Rights of the Child is another one that is in play here and is of great concern. The Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, the refugee convention, is another important international commitment that Canada has made. I think under all of those international agreements and also under the charter there will be challenges to this legislation, because in one way or another it is problematic. When we look at the Convention on the Rights of the Child, for instance, a delay in family reunification is an incredible violation of the rights of a refugee child. If a parent is here in Canada making a refugee claim, if the possibility of reunification for that child is delayed by five years, it is a very serious problem for that child and I think a very serious violation of that child's rights.

The most serious aspect of Bill C-49 is that it would create in our refugee legislation two classes of refugees: one class that is designated by the minister based on their mode of arrival, who would have different treatment compared to other refugees who land on our shores in Canada, who arrive in Canada by some other means. I think this is a clearly discriminatory provision.

In fact, it goes back on the commitments that we thought we had received from the government when the negotiation happened around Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. In that legislation, there was also an attempt to establish two classes of refugees and to have a designation system. It was based on the country of origin, on what were considered safe countries that could produce refugees and countries that were not considered safe, and we know that it is almost an impossible designation to make.

So in negotiations with the government we got that changed and we did away with that classification of refugees that was a key part of the previous bill, Bill C-11.

Now the government, in this bill, is trying to reintroduce that kind of designation system. This time, it is not based on the country of origin of the refugee but on how that refugee got to Canada, on his or her mode of arrival. I think that is just trying to get it back in when we thought we had dealt with that issue very clearly in the previous negotiations, in the previous legislation.

I think, too, the discretion that is afforded the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration in making these designations would be way off the scale. It would be too much. It would go way too far in allowing an individual minister the ability to make these decisions about who would be this designated refugee who loses some of the rights established under Canadian law for refugee determination. I think if there is any reason to have serious questions about this legislation, it is because of the establishment of these two classes of refugees and because of the incredible amount of discretion that it would afford the minister.

There are places for discretion for ministers of citizenship and immigration around humanitarian and compassionate considerations, for instance, because refugee and immigration cases are often reflections of people's very complex lives and that is a place where there needs to be some discretion for a minister, especially in this portfolio. However, I do not believe that allowing a minister to designate who is a first-class refugee and who is a second-class refugee or a no-class refugee is an appropriate addition to our immigration and refugee law in Canada. It is a very serious problem.

This bill, as we has mentioned, talks about mandatory detention of people who are designated by the minister as second-class refugees. There is mandatory detention without independent review. This kind of arbitrary detention is likely contrary to the charter and international law. Children will also be detained under this proposal. Unless they are accepted as refugees or released on discretionary grounds by the minister based upon exceptional circumstances, designated persons will remain in detention for a minimum of one year before having access to a review of their decisions. There are examples in Canadian law where that kind of process has been shown to be in contradiction of the charter.

The bill also talks about mandatory conditions being imposed upon release and for persons to be indefinitely detained beyond 12 months without the possibility of release if the minister is of the opinion that their identities have not been established. These measures seriously deprive people of liberty, without the opportunity for an independent tribunal to review whether they are necessary to their particular situations or to their particular cases.

The bill also denies refugee claimants in the designated class the right to appeal a negative refugee decision to the Immigration and Refugee Board's Refugee Appeal Division. It is frustrating to no end to have to be debating the need for a Refugee Appeal Division yet again in the House of Commons. The Refugee Appeal Division, an appeal of the decision of the Immigration and Refugee Appeal Board on a specific refugee case, was part of the new Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that came into effect in 2001. In fact, with the Liberal government of the day, the establishment of the Refugee Appeal Division was a compromise, worked out with all the parties in the House, that garnered support for that legislation.

Sadly, even though we won the Refugee Appeal Division in an important appeal in the refugee process, the Liberal government of the day and subsequent Conservative governments never put it in place. It was passed and was part of the law but was never implemented. This was a serious problem. We even had private members' legislation, committee reports and other motions that called upon the government to actually implement the established law of the land but to no avail.

Recently, in the debate on Bill C-11, again we thought we had won a victory where finally the Refugee Appeal Division, this important appeal of a negative refugee decision, would be implemented. However, now we see that the government is proposing, in Bill C-49, to remove that again. We think we have it but we do not implement it. We think we have it again and now we are going to limit it.

Every organization has said that this is an important aspect of refugee law and that it needs to be here in Canada. International organizations have commented that Canada needed to have this level of appeal, that Canada needed to uphold its existing refugee act, and that this was a crucial piece of what we should be about in our refugee laws. I am really disappointed that the government has again moved to limit the Refugee Appeal Division.

Family reunification is an issue. I mentioned the issue of blocking families from being reunited for five years and the issue of refugee integration into the community. This slows that process down, and that has been one of the successes of Canadian immigration law. We have moved new immigrants and refugees into positions of participation in society, of feeling that they belong in Canada, that they are valued members of the community, better than any other country, and yet here again in this legislation we are putting forward barriers to doing that, and we do that at our peril. We are turning our backs on what we have proven works and what other countries agree have worked.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in the debate today on Bill C-49, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and the Marine Transportation Security Act. In the tradition of the government, it has given it a nickname, the Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act.

Once again, as has been the case with all of the nicknames that it has come up with, it is a very misleading nickname because this bill really affects refugees far more than it will ever affect those who engage in human smuggling.

It is unfortunate with this bill that we have seen a real setback in the kind of progress we have made in this Parliament on immigration and refugee issues. We had a great example of co-operation, of cross-party co-operation, and government and opposition co-operation, with Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which passed unanimously in this House back in June. That was a place where the government introduced a bill to address issues it saw with the refugee determination process in Canada, in an attempt to make it more efficient, to speed it up and to address some of the problems existing in that process.

The opposition had trouble with that bill, but because there was an openness to dealing with the questions that the opposition had, a better bill was created. Unanimity was found, a rare thing in this minority Parliament, and I was hopeful about that kind of process. We saw, in one of the few occasions since it has come to power in the last two Parliaments, the government's willingness to actually work with others to craft a better bill, and that is what we ended up with.

Now we are set back with Bill C-49, which takes us back and tries to reopen some of the issues that the government apparently resolved back in Bill C-11. It is trying to reopen some of the issues on which it forged a compromise with the opposition parties back in the spring in this place.

That is very troubling. It seems that when we do the job that Canadians sent us here to do, to talk to each other, to do the things that are best for Canadians, when we finally have that opportunity, the government wants to turn its back on that development in a very dramatic way by reintroducing another bill that reforms a piece of legislation we just dealt with in June.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would not call them second class. I would call them no class. That is clear.

At the beginning, I said that this was really three bills. The first part of the bill, the one called An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, seems to be intended to propose amendments to Bill C-11, which is the bill that my colleague across the floor just mentioned. This was a bill in which we tried to bring balance to the way that the bill was going forward.

What Bill C-49 does to Bill C-11, under the guise of catching smugglers, is to change how Bill C-11 works. It changes how would-be refugees are accepted into the system in Canada; it changes this radically and people ought to know.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am rising in the House once again, this time to participate in today's debate about Bill C-49, which affects three laws: first, the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act—which means revisiting Bill C-11; second, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act—and I wonder if it really is balanced; and third, the Marine Transportation Security Act.

This bills aims to correct an illegal situation. It really is a government's responsibility to protect its border security. Security is clearly a critical issue for the entire world.

I would like to refer to certain international documents, agreements that Canada has signed, thus agreeing to be fully accountable for implementing their contents.

First, I would like to remind members that Canada signed the 1951 Geneva convention. It is also signed the protocol stipulating that individuals who have been victims of persecution since 1951 must also be subject to the Geneva convention. I will obviously come back to this during my speech.

The Geneva convention and the protocol that followed are the reasons why our refugee acceptance system was created. This system, despite its faults and weaknesses, and there are some, has become a model for industrialized countries.

This bill proposes a number of clauses that would punish smugglers, those who profit from the poor people who are trying to flee their country and come to Canada to live a life free of terror, discrimination, rape and killing. These smugglers receive enormous amounts of money and they violate international laws as well as our own Canadian laws.

In response to that, Bill C-49 proposes a substantial fine, for example a fine of $1 million for any criminal organization guilty of inducing, aiding or abetting a group of people to illegally enter Canada. That is from subclause 117(3), as it would be amended by the bill.

This amount depends on the number of people arriving in the group. The offenders could also receive a life sentence.

That is an improvement, in my opinion.

These clauses can certainly act as a real deterrent for smugglers hoping to bring groups of people illegally into Canada. Still, I would suggest that impounding the vessel or ship on which they come would be an additional deterrent to these smugglers. The price of smuggling then would become exorbitant and the loss of the vessel a real economic loss.

We also wish to congratulate the minister on his intention to work with local police forces in the home countries of human smugglers.

That aspect is not included in the bill, but is an important part of any concrete action.

Refugee claimants are not criminals. How many times must we repeat this? However, Bill C-49 treats them as if they were guilty of crimes, and again, this is what the bill suggests throughout the first part of it. Why are there only five sections of Bill C-49 that impact smugglers and twelve sections that impact refugees? We thought it was about smugglers. In fact, it is about changing the Canadian law, after study, which admits prospective refugees.

Another question I have is, why is this bill sponsored by the minister responsible for public safety and national security? Is it because the Conservative government wants to give Canadians the impression that refugee claimants pose a security threat? It tried to do this with the ship that arrived off the coast of British Columbia a few weeks ago, when in fact we see several weeks later that not one person has been held because he or she is a terrorist, yet the rumour goes on.

The people who are on these ships, or whatever mode of transport they use, are seeking safety and a good life in Canada. It is not their intention to break any international or Canadian law, yet the government presumes that they do so when it decides, through a bill like Bill C-49, to detain all the individuals designated as irregular arrivals. Irregular arrivals are those people who arrive in groups larger than, one would suppose, just a man, his wife and his children.

In this way, Bill C-49 is in direct violation of section 11(g) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which states that an individual is “not to be found guilty on account of any act or omission unless, at the time of the act or omission, it constituted an offence under Canadian or international law or was criminal according to the general principles of law recognized by the community of nations”.

These refugee claimants, these people who flee in exile, include women, elderly people, young children, men and quite often, as we have learned, even pregnant women.

As a signatory to the Geneva convention, Canada is duty bound to protect these claimants. But instead, Bill C-49 would have them immediately detained. Let us be clear: “detained” is a nicer way of saying “imprisoned” or “incarcerated”.

This is contrary to article 31(1) of the Geneva convention, which states, “The contracting states shall not impose penalties...provided [the refugees] present themselves without delay to the authorities and show good cause for their illegal entry or presence.”

Even if we agreed that detention is required, the length set out by Bill C-49 also goes against article 31(2), which states, “The contracting states shall not apply to the movements of such refugees restrictions other than those which are necessary and such restrictions shall only be applied until their status in the country is regularized. The Contracting States shall allow such refugees a reasonable period... ”

I would like to emphasize the word “reasonable”.

But this bill proposes keeping these people in prison, until their identity can be proven, for up to one year.

Those of us who have worked with refugees and for refugees know that quite often, these vulnerable people have had to leave very suddenly and cannot always bring their official documents to prove their identity.

I should also remind hon. members that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, of which we are all so proud, protects any person present on Canadian soil, regardless of their citizenship.

What about the negative consequences of detention on these people? As I was saying earlier, among these refugees we often see older people, very young children and pregnant women. Often they have been tortured, raped or abused in their country. They received no protection in their own country and they fled.

They did not receive protection from the smugglers during the dangerous voyage, but they had hope. When they arrive in Canada, despite what they might expect, they are not entitled to protection from the Canadian authorities either.

How do we explain to these young children why they are prison? What crime did they commit?

I would like to read from the Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989. Section 40(2)(a) of this convention stipulates that:

No child shall be alleged as, be accused of, or recognized as having infringed the penal law by reason of acts or omissions that were not prohibited by national or international law at the time they were committed;

How do we explain this clear violation to them?

Section 9 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms states:

Everyone has the right not to be arbitrarily detained or imprisoned.

However, under clause 20 of the new Bill C-49:

The Minister may, by order, having regard to the public interest, designate as an irregular arrival the arrival in Canada of a group of persons...

And, under clause 55 of the same bill:

If a designation is made under subsection 20.1(1), an officer must

(a) detain, on their entry into Canada, a foreign national who, as a result of the designation, is a designated foreign national;

or

(b) arrest and detain...

This is clearly an arbitrary detention.

It is regrettable that under clause 110, no appeal may be made by a refugee claimant in respect of a decision of the Refugee Protection Division. In Canada, even common criminals have the right to appeal a judge's decision.

Our humanitarian tradition that allows individuals the right to appeal decisions is entrenched, or I thought it was. Even Bill C-11, tabled in Parliament by the same minister, respected this right.

Bill C-49 also has hidden consequences. For example, section 11 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, as amended, would state that the designated foreign national may not make an application for permanent residence until five years have elapsed. Subsection 25. (1.01) of the same amended act would also state that the foreign national may not make an application until five years have elapsed. It is clear; it is stated twice in the bill.

Let us figure it out. When people arrive in Canada they are held for one year to prove their identity. The applicant may become a designated refugee, if all goes well. At that point, he must wait five years before making an application for permanent residence. Why? When the Immigration and Refugee Board establishes that someone is a refugee, that person is permitted to apply immediately for permanent residence in Canada. After the five years, if all goes well, the person applies but does not immediately become a permanent resident. We know it, I know it and everyone with immigrants in their riding knows it as well: two or three years may elapse before the government responds to the application. I estimate, and I do not believe I am exaggerating, that someone could wait up to 10 years before receiving permanent residence status in Canada.

During these 10 years not only he but his entire family will be in limbo, not knowing how life will unravel.

An irregular or designated refugee will therefore have to wait 10 years before being able to sponsor his or her family. Those are the hidden consequences of Bill C-49. Refugees cannot sponsor their families before becoming permanent residents of Canada. Given that they will not have the right to travel outside Canada during the entire period, they also will not be able to visit their spouse or children. That comes from a government that boasts about protecting family values. These family values are certainly not protected. Quite the opposite.

Amendments to the current immigration law proposed under Bill C-49 further consolidate the minister's legal authority to suspend an application for the consideration of any type of status, for example refugee status or even to be heard on humanitarian and compassionate grounds for access to Canada's protection, for a full five years. Let us not forget the individual would have already spent 12 months in jail, called detention, even before the government would look at the case. All these delays would be based on whatever the government deems to be the grounds for public policy. This amendment would then become part of section 25 of the IRPA as amended under Bill C-11.

This means that the timeline we just suggested, these 10 years, is the best-case scenario. It is not the scenario where the person is sent back or is refused anything in Canada. It is a scenario where he thinks he is going to stay, 10 years of limbo if the minister decides not to intervene.

Let us go back in time. Bill C-49 brings us back to the time of the Chinese exclusion act, the act that caused Chinese men to live their lives here in Canada without their wives, without their families. In fact many of these men never saw their families again. It caused economic hardship.

This is what caused the Canadian people to say they would not continue this, and this is when the concept of family reunification came in, when Canadians decided it was cruel to allow people, men and women, to stay here in Canada as Canadians and yet separate them from their families, wives, husbands and children, for we did not know how long.

Lo and behold, it was a Conservative prime minister, William Lyon Mackenzie King, who had the act repealed in 1947. How unfortunate that the present Conservative government cannot continue this humanitarian tradition.

Let us go back in time again to 1986—

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to stand today in support of Bill C-49, an act to prevent human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system.

Human smuggling is a transitional criminal enterprise that spans the globe and Interpol says that it is a growing global phenomena. This form of illegal commercial migration is very dangerous and it exploits those individuals who are captured within it. Human smugglers consider their passengers to be little more than cargo and the boats on which they carry their passengers are like nightmarish prisons.

Migrants are typically stranded at sea, on an overcrowded boat, with unsanitary and unsafe conditions. These conditions often lead to severe illness or cause fatal accidents. As a result of these inhumane conditions, people die in human smuggling operations every year. Nevertheless, many illegal migrants decide to risk their lives and undertake this perilous journey for their destination country.

By charging people large sums of money for their transportation, human smugglers have made a lucrative business out of facilitating illegal migration, often by counselling smuggled persons to claim asylum in the country to which they are smuggled. Once they arrive in their destination country, these migrants are often at the mercy of their human smugglers and forced to work for years in the illegal labour market just to pay off their debts to their smuggler.

The arrival of the MV Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady in a period of less than 12 months is a clear indication that Canada is becoming a favoured destination for these human smuggling networks. Interpol says that human smuggling syndicates benefit from weak legislation and low risk of detection, prosecutions and arrests compared to other transnational organized crimes. If we do not take strong action now, more vessels will arrive and more lives will be put at risk. We cannot just stand by and allow these exploitative operations to continue.

This legislation would enable us to crack down on the despicable human smugglers who prey on these vulnerable migrants, but it also aims to stop those tempted to use this perilous form of migration by introducing several disincentives.

A key disincentive is that those arriving as a result of a designated smuggling event would not be able to apply for permanent residency for a period of up to five years. This would apply whether they are found to be in need of protection or not. During this five year period, persons found to be in need of protection would be restricted from travelling outside of Canada and would be unable to apply for permanent residency to Canada through other means. As a result, they would not be eligible to sponsor family members into Canada or become Canadian citizens during that time period.

The legislation also proposes mandatory detention for up to one year, which would also help ensure the safety and the security of Canadians.

When these migrants arrive on our shores, we have no idea who they are or where they are from. Often, they arrive without proper documentation and we do not whether they are criminals or terrorists who pose a threat to our safety and our security. Mandatory detentions would allow us to properly verify and confirm the identities of individuals to determine whether they are in fact admissible to Canada or whether they are involved in some form of illegal activity. This proposal is entirely within reason and it is fair.

The government's priority is, first and foremost, to protect the safety and the security of Canadians. This is the least that Canadians can expect from their government.

We are also taking measures to ensure that these individuals have access to fewer Canadian benefits. As we all know, Canadians enjoy health services that are among the best and most generous in the world. We need to ensure that illegal migrants are not receiving health coverage that is more generous than what is offered to other Canadians. It certainly will not happen under this government.

Currently, asylum seekers, resettled refugees, failed asylum seekers awaiting removal, detained individuals and victims of trafficking are provided with temporary health coverage through the interim federal health program.

Under these proposed changes, the scope of the services provided under the IFH program would be limited for those who arrive in Canada illegally via human smuggling operations. They would receive only basic coverage, including medically necessary care and immigration medical exams that refugee claimants must take upon their arrival in order to ensure they do not pose a risk to public health or safety.

Canada's generosity should not make us a target for criminal activity such as smuggling operations. We must remove the incentives for people seeking to come here by way of human smuggling. In doing so, we will uphold the integrity of our immigration and refugee process and our programs and ensure that the safety and security of Canadians is put into place.

This has certainly taken the attention of the public over the past 12 months. We have seen two ships arrive in our country for the purposes of smuggling, which is why the scope of the bill needs to be implemented. I have heard opposition members claim that this bill is some sort of a knee-jerk reaction to what has happened. I find that compelling in a way because, if this were a reaction to what had happened, then they would have to argue that we are actually about 11 months late introducing this legislation.

This legislation was put together over the past series of months to ensure that we have legislation that is strong, that is certainly consistent with the charter and with our Constitution, and, most important, that is consistent with the feelings and the positions that Canadians have held on this issue across our country.

There is no doubt that the issue in itself is a difficult one. We all know and, as members of Parliament, we have listened to the positions, arguments and stories in our ridings of refugees who have claimed asylum. We have heard them say that they needed to come to Canada in order to escape the perils they faced in their country. There is no question that the reason these ships are here is that our system is so generous and open and we want to ensure that those who need protection and those who are truly refugees have a place to come to in safety where they can become Canadians, find employment, find a new way of life and raise their families in a country as democratic and open as Canada.

However, the fact remains that the only answer to solving this problem of ensuring those who are clearly refugees, clearly want to be here and clearly need to be here go through the process that we have in place.

The previous speaker mentioned Bill C-11, which is exactly what this country needed in terms of reforming our refugee legislation. We took great pains to get through that process. I know, as the parliamentary secretary, we worked hours upon hours and days upon days to get that legislation back to the House of Commons so it would be supported at third reading. When it did come back here, it in fact received support from all parties. We now have a new system in terms of refugee reform legislation that will be implemented over the next 18 months.

Bill C-49 is so well augmented with Bill C-11 that we will have completely reformed and changed the direction that this country needs to take when it comes to refugees and those who need to seek asylum here. They will need to seek asylum in a way that follows the system that we have in place, not to jump the queue and not to be forced by smugglers, who take advantage of every person on that boat, to pay for their freedom rather than earn that freedom through a process that we have in place, which is one of the most generous in the world. We cannot have it.

The Canadian people have spoken loud and clear on this issue. The one thing that we need to continue to come back to is fairness, because this is what the Canadian people understand so much better than the rest of the world. No Canadian wants to see individuals living in peril in their country. If it is important enough for us to understand that freedom of security, of governance and of democracy needs to happen here in this country and they deserve that, then our arms are wide open to them, but we have a process and a system.

There are people who are taking advantage of these individuals, charging them more money then they could ever afford in their lifetime, to get on to a boat and somehow find a way to come here. They make promises and claims. They literally push those individuals onto the vessel to get them here to Canada. They tell the individuals that Canada will accept them, that Canadian laws are so generous and in need of so much repair that when they land here they will be given the status they so want.

Those refugees who have a rightful claim and a rightful place for freedom will get that here in this country. However, those who do not are standing in the way of those who actually do.

This process of human smuggling, of bringing people into this country by crowding them onto a ship and having them land on Canadian soil, is not the way Canadians want this to happen. Canadians want to know who is on that ship and who is going to claim refugee status here.

Simply turning these hundreds of individuals loose on Canadian soil has the potential to put Canadian lives and health in peril. We do not know where these individuals have come from. We do not know if they are true refugees. We do not know if they are terrorists. We do not know if they are criminals in their own country. That is not the type of environment we want here in this country.

This bill changes all of that. It sets in place a process that will show respect for those who truly deserve refugee status. It will send a loud and clear message to countries and smugglers who live off the proceeds of these individuals that we will not be in a position as a country to accept this any more.

The Minister of Public Safety, the President of the Treasury Board, and the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration and Multiculturalism made this announcement in front of one of the ships that arrived here. They made the announcement on the west coast, but that message travelled to the east coast of our country almost immediately. There is page after page of endorsement. Group after group, editorial after editorial, Canadian after Canadian have said that this legislation is right, it is timely, it is good, it is fair. It is something that everyone in this House should be supporting.

One headline reads, “Ottawa tightens rules on human smuggling”. The Headline News article states:

The bill, titled “Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada’s Immigration System Act,” shows that Ottawa will not tolerate abuse of the system by getting ahead of the immigration line, but stresses that the federal government of Canada will continue to welcome legitimate immigrants who could contribute to the country.

An editorial in the Calgary Herald stated:

Tough anti-smuggling legislation aimed at stopping boats of illegal migrants from showing up on Canadian shores, places the punishment where it belongs, on the smugglers.

...It's a welcome crackdown on a crime most Canadians would agree is heinous.

The list goes on. Another editorial on human smuggling stated:

The government must act to safeguard the integrity of Canada's immigration system, which welcomes 250,000 newcomers a year. Polls show that the public's high level of support for immigration dipped by 20 per cent after the arrival of the Sun Sea and the Ocean Lady -- even though asylum seekers and skilled immigrants are two very different streams.

That is a very important point to realize. We are a country that accepts, at the present time, per capita more immigrants than anywhere else in the world. We are open to skilled immigrants. We are open to low-skilled immigrants. We are open to seasonal workers. We are open to immigrants who want to come to this country to build a new life for themselves and their families.

What we are not open to is those who want to come here to take advantage of our system, those who in fact want to move to the front of the line. Smugglers know this. They know that in their hearts Canadians want to help these people so they take advantage of it.

By passing this legislation, we would at least be putting ourselves in a position where we no longer would be that country where terrorists and smugglers simply say, “We will dump them all in Canada. We will make millions and millions of dollars, and we will dump them all in Canada because Canada does not have the laws in place to prevent this from happening”.

Canadians have spoken loudly on this issue. They want to welcome new immigrants to this country. Many of us in this House have parents or grandparents who came to this country as immigrants. There are members in the House who came to this country to become Canadians. All of them have done it in a way that respects the rule of law in this country and that respects the system of fairness that all Canadians have come to accept.

The opposition is trying to say that this is something it is not, that this is a position we hold because we want to hurt people. It is the exact opposite. That type of rhetoric has no place in this House of Commons.

There are individuals and families who need our help, but those families and individuals are not just those who seek refugee status in our country. They are the very families and individuals who are Canadians and are here right now.

We need a system of fairness. We need a system of equality. We need a system of acceptance. We need a system that protects Canadians, but says to those who claim refugee status that we are a country that is open, we are a country that is free, we are a county that is accepting, but let us make sure that we do it with fairness and that we do it through a system that protects the individuals who are truly refugees and that protects Canadians here.

This is legislation we need. This is legislation that Canadians want. This is legislation that will actually put our country in a position not only to promote why this is a great country to come to, but why this is a great country in which to live.

There are smugglers and others who take advantage of the most down and out in an attempt to profit, and there may be those in the opposition who would allow that to continue and will vote against this legislation. However, there is no one on this side of the House who will do that. We are going to make sure that we fight as long and hard as we need to in order to put this legislation in place and bring our system up to where it needs to be.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the minister can look at the blues. I said that the Bloc Québécois would be prepared to support a government bill that punished human smugglers. The problem is that, because of these smugglers, we are creating a new category, designated foreign nationals. That is the Conservative philosophy and ideology that the Bloc Québécois has always opposed. We should not create different categories of refugees based on their country of origin or the way they arrive in Canada. They all should be treated the same way.

That is why we were prepared to support the government's Bill C-11. We would also be prepared to support Bill C-49 if it addressed only human smugglers. The Conservatives are taking advantage of the problem with human smugglers and the media attention around the arrival of a boat to push their right-wing ideology. We will always be opposed to this Conservative right-wing ideology, under which they are incapable of treating all human beings, especially children, the same way.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

I understand the minister because those people, obviously, are not Canadian citizens. But they are still citizens of the world who have a right to benefit from the treaties that Canada has ratified and that allow them to seek asylum.

Once again, what we are seeing with Bill C-49 is that the public safety minister can designate as irregular an arrival in Canada of a group of persons, who then become designated foreign nationals. Designated foreign nationals who claim refugee or protected person status will be treated differently from other asylum seekers. The fact that different applicants would be treated differently is what we found to be unacceptable in Bill C-11. In Bill C-49, a different status is created for these designated foreign nationals.

If they are denied refugee status, they have to wait five years before they can apply for permanent resident status. In the meantime, their claim could be re-evaluated to determine whether they can return to their country.

They cannot travel outside Canada or apply for permanent resident status or citizenship for five years. Consequently, they cannot sponsor members of their family, such as their spouse or children. Designated foreign nationals who have been denied asylum cannot appeal to the new refugee appeal division, only to the Federal Court. They also will not have access to health benefits that other refugees can access through the interim federal health program.

And so, not only is the principle of fairness—which says that all refugees have access to the system—being called into question, but asylum seekers who arrive in a group will be in a sort of legal vacuum for five years, which will strip them of the same rights given to asylum seekers who follow the usual refugee process. Just because a group of people arrives, that does not mean that they are not legitimate refugees, and the Bloc Québécois feels that this categorization would be extremely prejudicial to them.

The acceptance rate for refugee claims by Sri Lankan Tamils is 80% on average, and there is no indication that the situation in Sri Lanka will change and that it will be deemed that their lives are not in peril.

It must be understood that the Bloc Québécois' objective has never changed and has always been to oppose categories based on the origin of claimants or how they arrived here, because Canada has signed international treaties. Therefore, these people can make a claim, but that does not mean it will be accepted. We need an analysis process that is effective and quick. For that reason, the Bloc Québécois asked for the current process to be revised and for an appeal division to be set up so these individuals would have the opportunity to assert their rights. It must be effective, and we have to invest the money needed to do that.

The Conservative ideology was bolstered by the arrival of a large number of refugees, which received extensive media coverage. The Conservatives decided to make this their priority and to set aside all the opportunities they had to modernize the current process through Bill C-11.

This does not bode well for future discussions. In fact, the legal vacuum created for this category of designated foreign nationals, who are not yet classified as refugees, keeps these designated foreigners in legal limbo for five years, when they file a claim for refugee or protected person status. During that time, they cannot apply for permanent residence or family reunification. Consequently, they cannot sponsor members of their family or their spouse. Furthermore, they are not free to move or to enjoy all the rights that other claimants may have.

As I mentioned, Canada's international and constitutional obligations are important. Not only does this bill run counter to its international obligations under at least three treaties it has signed, but it also contravenes the Constitution and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which states in subsection 15(1):

Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability.

Which includes how they get to Canada.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to be speaking, on behalf of the Bloc Québécois, about Bill C-49, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and the Marine Transportation Security Act.

It is important to clearly understand the objectives of this bill. One of the objectives is to allow the public safety minister to designate as irregular an arrival in Canada of a group of persons, who are categorized as “designated foreign nationals”. Designated foreign nationals who claim refugee or protected person status will be treated differently from other asylum seekers.

That is the reality. My Conservative colleagues are trying to tell us that this bill is meant to crack down on human smugglers, but its real objective is to create two categories of refugees, or rather a new category for designated foreign nationals. That is the reality.

Again, the Bloc Québécois will not support Bill C-49 and will vote against it, because it aims to do more than just crack down on human smugglers. It will punish people who are fleeing persecution, including children. Once again, the Conservatives are using a specific example from recent events—which made headlines in Quebec and Canada—to advance their law and order agenda, even though the measures they are proposing will not change the situation. The reality is that these people have arrived, they are here and the bill will not change anything in terms of the situation that unfolded when the last boat arrived in British Columbia.

The Bloc Québécois therefore opposes any new refugee category that would be justified only by the manner in which refugee claimants arrive. The fact that claimants arrive in a group does not mean they are not legitimate refugees. The Bloc Québécois believes that a new category that puts even heavier burdens on refugees would be prejudicial. We also deplore the fact that this government is backtracking, after a compromise had been reached on refugee reform. For years now, we have been calling for the refugee system to be updated and for the creation of an appeal system. We had nearly reached an agreement with the government, but instead it has decided to push ahead with its agenda rather than a compromise, because of a media event.

We in the Bloc Québécois believe it is simply inconceivable that all refugee claimants who arrive in a group can automatically be imprisoned for a maximum of 12 months, with no possibility of disputing their arrest. Worse still, according to the bill, that period can be extended indefinitely. This is a matter of fundamental human rights and democracy, specifically, the right to liberty. No human being should have to face such a situation.

This bill on illegal immigration goes against the Charter of Rights and Freedoms as well as Canada's international obligations under the 1951 refugee convention, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Bloc Québécois believes that it would be completely irresponsible to vote in favour of a bill that flies in the face of at least three treaties meant to protect fundamental human rights.

For years, the governments, Liberal and Conservative alike, have allowed the current refugee system to get bogged down without doing anything about it. The thing that should be noted about this alarming statement is that this is not the first time the Conservative government has tried to resolve the problem by tightening the rules around asylum seekers coming to Canada. Take, for instance, the decision to require visas from Mexicans and foreign nationals from the Czech Republic, or the government's unwavering desire to develop a list of safe countries of origin as part of the refugee system reform. We do indeed detect, in the development of immigration policies, a discriminatory tendency to want to close the borders, including to those who are seeking refugee status. The proof is in the targeted range for total protected persons, which went from between 26,000 and 31,800 in 2008 to between 19,600 and 26,000 in 2010, not to mention the growing use of propaganda rhetoric that, in the name of national security, is used to justify taking a hard-line approach to this category of immigrants.

Although the government is saying it wants to punish human smugglers with this bill, it is instead punishing people who are fleeing persecution, including children. Once again, the government is being utterly discriminatory toward these refugees and is putting words into action to separate what it considers to be good refugees from bad refugees, as though their lives were not equally threatened.

The current system is bogged down because no one wanted to modernize it. When refugees arrive in large numbers, the government's tendency, which was solidified under the Liberals and confirmed by the Conservatives, is to tighten the system and prohibit them from entering the country. Under international treaties that Canada has signed, refugees deserve at least to have their file reviewed. Will we keep them all here? Not at all. Far from it. We will offer hospitality to those who truly need it and who are being persecuted in their home country, but we have to develop an effective file analysis system that respects human rights.

The Bloc Québécois has repeatedly shown the House that the existing system should be updated. The Liberals did not want to do it. The Conservatives appeared to want to do it—we hoped so, at least—but the Minister of Immigration was rebuffed with this bill, which flatly rejects everything he had put in place through discussions and negotiations to change the existing system. By creating a new class of refugees or foreign nationals requesting asylum, they are rejecting all improvements to the existing system.

I will now turn to security. When the MV Sun Sea arrived, the government issued a barrage of public statements positioning the arrival of boats as a threat to the security of Quebeckers and Canadians. As it turns out, those statements were unfounded. True to their ideology, the Conservatives used a widely reported event to promote their own political law and order agenda. There was no reason to believe that the arrival of the MV Sun Sea posed a threat to the security of Quebeckers and Canadians.

Under the existing law, any asylum seeker arriving by boat must be fingerprinted, photographed and interviewed. Canada's waters are under the authority of the Canada Border Services Agency, the CBSA, which has the power to detain asylum seekers if there are any doubts about their identity and to oppose their release before the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, Immigration Division.

Some of the other 76 Tamils from Sri Lanka who arrived last year aboard the Ocean Lady and requested asylum remained behind bars for more than six months. None of them were found to be members of the Tamil Tigers or any similar organization. They were eventually released once the CBSA found that they were not a threat to national security.

Let us not forget that the 492 passengers aboard the MV Sun Sea accounted for less than 2% of the asylum requests received annually. The record, 5%, occurred in 1999, when four boats arrived carrying 600 asylum seekers. In 2010, the number of requests should be around 25,000, the lowest average in the past 20 years.

Arguments to the effect that the arrival of huge numbers of refugees poses a threat to public safety do not hold up. They certainly do not justify passing a bill that treats refugee claimants so harshly. We are not saying that smugglers should not be punished. However, this bill punishes legitimate refugee claimants. That is the problem. In addition, we feel that the existing act has all the mechanisms required to manage the arrival of these boats.

Why create a new category? The Conservatives simply decided to advance their ideological agenda.

Let us examine the compromise struck by Bill C-11. The Conservative government seems to be obsessed with classifying refugee claimants based on their numbers or origin. Such a measure was widely denounced when Bill C-11 on reform of the asylum system was studied. Initially, the federal government wanted especially to implement the concept of designated countries. Failed claimants from countries deemed to be safe would not have had access to the new refugee appeal division, a measure deemed extremely discriminatory by the Bloc Québécois.

The Conservative government insisted on this country classification. It said that, if this measure was not accepted, it would scuttle its own bill. Imagine. By making a strong case for refugee rights to the government and the other parties, the Bloc Québécois helped members reach a last-minute compromise designed to produce a reform that was truly effective and, even more importantly, fair to all asylum seekers.

Once again, it is important to understand that under international treaties that Canada has signed or recognized—and that Quebec would have signed if it were a country—all refugee claimants are treated with respect and have the right to be treated fairly, no matter their country of origin.

Even though the concept of designated countries still exists, this division will be accessible to everyone, including claimants from the designated countries. To compensate for that, two other expediting mechanisms were put in place. That was the compromise with Bill C-11. If the Refugee Protection Division rejects a claim for refugee protection, it may state in its reasons for the decision that the claim is manifestly unfounded if it is of the opinion that the claim is clearly fraudulent. Unsuccessful claims submitted by claimants from the same country that are referred to the RAD would then be expedited. There will be regulations regarding the processing times for refugee claimants from a designated country. They will be shorter than for regular claims so that claimants who file unfounded claims can be deported as quickly as possible.

The Bloc Québécois cannot believe that the government has decided to take a step backwards, when a compromise had been made regarding the reform of the current refugee system. In fact, with Bill C-49, the government is creating a new category of refugee, based solely on the way the refugee claimant arrives. That is what is unacceptable.

The Bloc Québécois agreed to make compromises on Bill C-11. The government wanted safe countries. For those arriving from these countries, there was no division that applied, while for those not arriving from safe countries, there was a division that did not apply. All the government said was that the same standards apply to everyone, but for certain countries, the processing time would be shorter. Obviously, that was a compromise that the Bloc Québécois could accept, given the Conservatives' intransigence. Now, the government has changed its mind and is ignoring all of the debates and forcing Bill C-49 on us, because there was a story in the news that gave the government the opportunity to advance its ideological agenda, whether it will admit it or not. Once again, I was listening to the Conservative member who spoke before me. He made it clear that the goal was to combat illegal smuggling, but the real goal is to create a system that treats refugee claimants differently when they arrive by that means.

So there is a new category. The Minister of Public Safety, citizens of the world—

Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this bill. The bill should be called “attack the refugees” and not preventing human smugglers from abusing Canada's immigration system act. If it was about human smugglers, then there would not be amendments to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to deal with the refugees and immigration portion. There are only a few pages in the act that deals with human smugglers. We prefer to attack the criminals, the traffickers and smugglers and not the victim.

The bill concentrates absolute power in the hands of the minister to decide which refugees will be subjected to draconian measures. With no clear definition on irregular arrivals, it can apply to any group of refugees, immigrants, or visitors.

The bill would also hurt legitimate refugees and those who help them. It would prevent refugees from bringing their spouses and children to Canada for at least 10 years. It would detain women and children that the minister deemed arrived in Canada irregularly for at least a year. It would repeat a shameful chapter of Canadian history by punishing and interning refugees and their children.

I will speak about the impact of detaining children, children who have not committed any crime.

A study was done recently by the United Kingdom. Over 15 months, the U.K. detained 1,300 children. On average that is 1,000 per year. There were 889 children detained for more than 28 days.

The report by the Royal College of Paediatrics and the Royal College of Psychiatrists found many elements. It found that detaining children was harmful to their mental health and that they were filled with terror. It found that children who saw their parents cry and in stress led to eating, sleeping, and learning problems. Of the children studied, 73% of those who were detained had emotional and behavioural problems. They were disoriented, depressed, anxious, confused and frightened. They had nightmares and some refused to feed themselves. A few of the children lost 10% of their body weight and one-quarter of them began bed-wetting. There was a regression of language. One child out of twenty-five became selectively mute. Many of the children had somatic symptoms like headaches and stomach pains.

This kind of treatment, putting children in jail and in detention, is callous and cruel. The U.K. did a review and the new Conservative coalition government said that it was a moral outrage that children were detained.

Canada detains six to seven children per night. If this bill passes, there would be a dramatic increase because any number of these children and their parents, whether women or men, will be part of the people designated as arriving to Canada in an irregular manner, whatever that means.

Every four weeks a judge in the U.K. has to sign a new authorization to continue to detain a child. This bill says that a child arriving on the shores of Canada, irregularly, will be detained for at least a year and then there will be a hearing every six months. A child could be detained for at least 12 months if not more.

Seeking a release after a year would have no appeal process, which would bring it to the courts. The government would not be bound by the court. I always thought Canada had a rule of law and that we should not do things in an arbitrary manner. The bill would do that.

Canada has some dark history. I previously talked about the boat, the S.S. St. Louis, that came to Canada in the late 1930s after going to the U.S. The boat arrived at Halifax harbour carrying 900 Jewish refugees who were seeking sanctuary. Tragically, because of racism, xenophobia, hatred and anti-Semitism, these refugees were sent away. Two hundred and fifty of them were murdered in the Holocaust after returning to Europe. The refugee law at that time was unjust, cruel and mean-spirited and it led to death. We have always said that never again would we practice the policy of none is too many. We have always said that we will not repeat history.

The bill would allow a boat such as the S.S. St. Louis to dock in Canada. However, those people, whether they are men, women or children, would be detained for at least a year. We may tell some of them that they are genuine refugees and they will be allowed to stay, but they will not be allowed to apply for permanent residence and therefore will not be able to sponsor their children or spouses to come to Canada for at least five years.

What would happen if the people on the S.S. St. Louis were accepted after a few years? They would have to wait for five years and then apply for permanent residence and bring their children over. However, because of the huge backlog, they will have to wait three to four years to bring their children over, no matter whether their children are coming from a refugee camp or another country and facing persecution. A person deemed to be a genuine refugee would have to wait at least nine years to bring a son, daughter, spouse to Canada. How many people would survive in a refugee camp, especially a child, for nine years?

Therefore, we are talking about punishing and attacking refugees, and not just those who arrive on Canada's shores. We are also talking about their relatives who are stuck back home. We are telling them that they either do not come to Canada, or if they do, they have to kiss goodbye their kids or their spouse for at least nine or ten years. They might never see them again.

What kind of law is this? It is not about dealing with smugglers. It is about attacking the refugee claimants. What is happening with these refugees. They will be victimized three times: first, by the persecutors, whoever is hunting them down; second, by the smugglers; and finally, by Canada. It also will incur huge costs. It costs at least $80,000 to $90,000 per person we detain or jail in Canada. We should think of the cost that it will incur to Canadian taxpayers.

Many of them could easily work and being paying taxes. Why will we not allow them to do that, while we process their claims and process them quickly? However, that is not what we are doing. We will just detain them.

Very few refugees know about the kind of laws of the countries to which they go. They do not search them out. In fact, studies show nine out of ten of these people do not know the laws of these countries. We know that Australia, for example, has a very punitive law, but it has not stopped the boats from arriving on its shores or deterred people from arriving there.

For months we debated the issue that all refugees coming to the shores of Canada must be treated equally under one set of rules, one law. We dealt with that in Bill C-11. We said that every person must be treated equally under the law. That is our charter. However, this bill would set up two classes of refugees. One would be the designated kind and they would be treated much worse than others who somehow have arrived in Canada.

The detention, as I said earlier, is arbitrary. The minister may on discretionary grounds based on “exceptional circumstances” be able to release a few people, but we know we should not leave things in an arbitrary manner. It should be set in law so it is clear who will be jailed and who will not be.

The law basically says that all who come here in an irregular fashion will be detained for over a year. It also says that they will not have an opportunity to have an independent tribunal to review their case because if the minister decides their identity has not been established, then there would not be any independent tribunal to review their case, which again, in some ways, contrary to the charter and international law.

Why am I talking so much about detention? A few weeks ago, Toronto held a event called Nuit Blanche, which is an art extravaganza. There were a lot of art shows in different parts of town. I went into a gallery that had a big photo exhibit. The photo exhibit also had tapes and recordings of people in detention in the U.K. I have never heard these kinds of stories first hand from the people who have been detained, but the stories are phenomenal, especially from the children and young people, about the kind of suffering. On average in the U.K it is only for a few weeks, yet the kind of trauma they experience is unbelievable. These are the ones who are awaiting deportation. They have already had their cases judged against them.

In the case we are dealing with, we have not even judged against them yet. Many of them could be genuine refugees and yet we are still jailing them, including their kids. Therefore, it is not possible for us to support a bill of this kind.

Another thing about the bill is that if people's refugee claim gets rejected they would not be able to go to the Refugee Appeal Division. We debated the Refugee Appeal Division for about 10 years and we said that all refugees must have the right to be heard in front of an independent tribunal, which we were about to set up, called the Refugee Appeal Division. By eliminating the opportunity to correct errors at the first level, the bill again puts Canada at risk of violating its most fundamental obligation toward refugees, which is not to send them back to their death.

The bill has other elements that are difficult. It would prevent refugees from going outside Canada. For example, if refugees wanted to go to a United Nations war crime convention or testify to a panel dealing with war crimes, they would not be able to do so. I can understand why the minister said that it was important to ensure they do not go back to the place where they claim they are being persecuted. However, this law actually says that they would not be able to leave Canada at all because they would not be able to get a travel document. Again, that is a problem. By detaining refugees for so long, it makes it harder for refugees to integrate into Canadian society and eventually apply for citizenship. We have seen real problems with this. This was tried with the Somali refugees in the 1990s when thousands were denied permanent residence for years.

Let us look at Australia, which is where I know the minister has been. In the last three years, Australia has moved away from a policy of detention and temporary status for refugees. I do not know why we are repeating what it has moved away from.

What is really in front of us are two options. One is to see refugees, newcomers as a burden. Refugee claimants can be seen as burdens or we could care for them. We did that. We saw the St. Louis refugee claimants as burdens. We made a mistake. We sent people to their death. We cared for the Vietnamese boat people, welcomed them and allowed them to stay and they are doing extremely well in Canada. What is it that we plan to do? Do we see refugees as burdens or do we see them as worthy of our care?

I would support the elements in this bill that punish smugglers in a serious manner. Those are elements that we could definitely support because we do not want to be soft on crime, especially for people who are committing crimes against immigrants or refugees, and we need to punish them harshly. However, what we should not do is attack the refugees. We should not attack the victims because this will not assist Canada's reputation or we will just end up repeating a very sad, tragic chapters of Canadian history where we interned people and where we sent people to their death.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Madam Speaker, the solution is quite simple, which should please the minister. It is simply Bill C-11, which he introduced in the House last spring, regarding the balanced refugee reform that was passed unanimously with a few amendments that everyone agreed on. It was indeed a balanced reform that gave the minister all the tools needed for action.

If he truly believes that the bill introduced by the Minister of Public Safety is the solution for dealing with illegitimate claimants, why does it only deal with those who arrive by boat? Why does it target only 2% of all refugee claimants, and moreover, those who arrive from countries that have some of the highest acceptance rates in the world? The minister says he needs legislation, but he needs it for the 2% of claimants for whom it is least needed. What is the point?

If the minister truly believed this, he would have introduced something that would target the other 98%, not just the 2% that have the highest acceptance rates.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

moved that Bill C-49, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and the Marine Transportation Security Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Madam Speaker, I am proud to open the debate on Bill C-49, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, whose purpose is to combat the serious crime of human smuggling.

I am pleased to introduce this bill. Canada is very proud of its long tradition of being a place of migration for people from around the world. We receive more newcomers than any other country in the developed world, 0.8% of our population, every year as new permanent residents.

We are also proud of our long humanitarian tradition of being a place of protection and refuge for victims of persecution and violence, those who need our protection. This goes back long into our history, in fact to the days of the arrival of the United Empire Loyalists, the Black Loyalists, the Underground Railroad, the eastern European refugees before the war, the refugees from Hungary and Soviet and Communist oppression after the war, and, most famously, the over 60,000 Indo Chinese who were welcomed by Canadians in 1979 and 1980. This underscores our long and deep humanitarian tradition as a place of protection.

Canada receives more resettled refugees than any other developed country in the world. This is so important to Canadians that our government announced earlier this year an increase of 20% in the number of resettled refugees who we will receive. That means that, beginning next year, we will welcome some 14,000 refugees in need of our protection each and every year, which is in addition to those who come to Canada making asylum claims that are assessed by our Immigration and Refugee Board and through various appeals and administrative appeals in our legal system.

One of the problems this Parliament recognized was the abuse of that asylum system, which is why Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act, was adopted unanimously by this Parliament following all party co-operation in the spring in order to significantly speed up the process of refugee determination, providing protection to bona fide refugees and the removal of those who seek to abuse Canada's generosity.

However, Canadians are deeply concerned with a particularly pernicious crime, a crime that exploits vulnerable people in their dream to come to Canada, the dangerous crime of human smuggling.

In the past year, it is well known that Canada has received two large vessels on our west coast, together carrying nearly 600 illegal migrants to our shores, people who, based on our intelligence, had paid criminal smuggling syndicates some $50,000 each in order to come to Canada in the most dangerous and exploitative way possible.

The remarkable openness of Canada to immigration in general and refugee protection in particular, which makes possible our very generous approach to immigration, is dependent on public confidence in the system. I submit that Canadians demand an immigration system that is characterized by a sense of fair play and a rule of law. What disturbs them deeply about these mass illegal smuggling operations is precisely that they undermine those principles of fundamental fairness and the rule of law.

The position of Canadians and the position of this government is and ought to be that we will be a country of openness, we will be a country that provides protection to those who are in need of it and we will lead the world in the moral obligation of refugee protection, but we will not be treated like a doormat by criminal networks that seek to profit from, frankly, encouraging people to come to this country illegally in a fashion that puts them and others in moral danger. We know that every year hundreds and potentially thousands of people around the world fall victim to the dangerous ruse of smuggling syndicates.

Let me be very specific about the problem we face and then allow me to identify the strong but fair remedies that we propose in Bill C-49 and in certain associative operational actions that are taken by this government and its agencies.

First, I came back last month from a visit to Asia, including to Southeast Asia, where I met with counterparts in various foreign governments. I met with our own Canadian intelligence police, border security and Immigration officials and learned a great deal about the vile trade of human smuggling in that region.

What I learned was the following. There are approximately three or four criminal syndicates operating in that region that have a long history of being involved in the arms smuggling trade. Because there has been an end to hostilities in the Sri Lankan civil war, those syndicates have now decided to smuggle and to traffic a different commodity, which is human beings. They have refocused their logistical ability to selling people the opportunity to be smuggled illegally to Canada.

I have been told by our partners in the region that they believe these syndicates have the capacity to deliver several large steel hulled vessels with the ability to bring in each hundreds of illegal smuggled migrants to Canada each year. Prospectively thousands of people are being smuggled to our country in this dangerous fashion.

This government, any government and any minister of immigration, as my friend from Toronto knows well, has a profound responsibility to maintain public confidence in the immigration system. What we have seen since the arrival of the last smuggling vessel is a fundamental and very disturbing decline in public support for immigration in general and refugee protection in particular.

According to the most recent polling that I have seen, over 60% of Canadians say that our response to this threat to our sovereignty, our laws and the fairness of our immigration system should be to prohibit these vessels from entering Canadian territorial waters. Fifty-five per cent of Canadians have said that even if these vessels land and some of their passengers subsequently attain refugee protection under our laws, that those people should be returned to their country of origin, notwithstanding a positive legal determination on their asylum claim.

That is the public opinion environment. Imagine how much more vigorous Canadians would feel about this, if we actually had several vessels arriving, which I am informed is within the logistical capability of the criminal organizations involved.

We cannot allow that to happen. The easier path is to do nothing. The easier path is to mouth platitudes. The easier path is to take no difficult decisions. However, the necessary and responsible path is to take firm and meaningful action that does everything we reasonably and legally can to deter and disrupt the smuggling networks, to reduce both the pull and the push factors in this illegal migration so that it stops. To do otherwise is to put at risk the broad public consensus, which has historically existed in Canada in favour of immigration and refugee protection, and I will not allow that to happen on my watch as minister of Immigration.

Some would have us believe that we can successfully deter the smuggling operations simply by focusing on the smugglers. How I wish that were true. How I wish it were true that we did not have to, at the same time, address the demand side of the equation in the smuggling enterprise. However, to pretend that is the case, to pretend that we can avoid disincentivizing the customers of the syndicates from paying $50,000 to come to Canada is naive in the extreme.

Therefore, let me present the general approach of the government and then the legislation in particular.

First, it is evident there are legitimate refugees in need of protection in Southeast Asia. It is also true, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, that it is always preferable to find a local or regional protection solution for those who are bona fide refugees and to do everything possible to prevent them from being exploited by trafficking syndicates. That is why we have begun preliminary discussions with our international partners, including Australia, which obviously has a great stake in this issue, and with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to pursue the possibility of some form of regional protection framework in the Southeast Asian region.

In part that would entail encouraging the countries now being used as transit points for smuggling and trafficking to offer at least temporary protection to those deemed by the UN in need of protection and then for countries such as Canada to provide, to some extent, reasonable resettlement opportunities for those deemed to be bona fide refugees, which is something we are pursuing.

However, to be honest, that is a mid to long-term solution. Working on that with the UN and our international partners will not stop the fact that criminal networks in Southeast Asian countries are planning to smuggle their customers to Canada. They are in the process right now. People have already paid their upfront fee and are sitting in waiting positions in parts of Southeast Asia. Vessels have been acquired. Officials have been, shall we say, induced to co-operate with these networks. The operations are not abstract. This is not a possibility. This is not a theory. This is a real and present reality and we must react with real, present and current action to disincentivize the smuggling networks.

It is also true, insofar as we are talking about a flow of illegally smuggled migrants of Tamil origin, that we acknowledge Canadians have a stake in seeing a just and durable peace in Sri Lanka. We acknowledge that the Tamil people have legitimate aspirations and that they deserve to be protected from violence and persecution. That is why, through the Department of Foreign Affairs, our High Commission in Colombo and through multilateral institutions, we continue to strongly encourage the government of Sri Lanka to make every effort to find a just resolution to the legitimate aspirations of its Tamil minority. That is one important issue. A regional protection framework is another important issue.

Perhaps the most important element in combatting the smuggling is to stop the boats from leaving the transit countries in the first place. That is why our government has directed relevant security and intelligence agencies to increase their presence and capability in the transit countries, partly to assist the transit countries in improving their capacity to detect fraudulent documents and smuggling networks and to gather better and actionable intelligence to prevent people from being loaded on to the vessels in the first place.

In this respect, I would note that two weeks ago the Royal Thai Police detained some 150 individuals who were in the country illegally, without status. Apparently they were planning to board vessels to be smuggled possibly to Canada. Therefore, that work is being done as well. There is increased and improved police and intelligence co-operation in the region among ourselves, the Australians and the transit countries.

However, should a vessel successfully leave a transit country, and we are talking about these leaky, decommissioned cargo vessels that people are loaded onto like cattle to take the dangerous voyage across the Pacific, and arrive in our territorial waters, Canada, after the adoption of Bill C-49, will continue to fully honour our humanitarian, domestic and international legal obligations to provide refugee protection.

We will not endanger the lives of people, as some would have us do, to prevent them from entering Canadian waters. Nor will we violate our international obligations under the convention for refugees and torture or our domestic obligations under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to provide protection to those who are deemed by our legal system to be in need of it, to have a well-founded fear of persecution in their country of origin. This is to say that we will not, in the technical term refoulement, send back to the country of origin someone who has arrived even through this dangerous, illegal and irregular form of marine migration.

We do need to send a strong message to the smugglers, which is why Bill C-49 proposes strong mandatory minimum prison sentences for those involved in smuggling operations. Those who are involved in smuggling under 50 people would face a mandatory minimum prison sentence of at least 3 years. If there are one of two aggravating factors involved, they would face a mandatory minimum of five years. If the group is over 50 individuals, they could face a mandatory minimum of 5 years unless there was an aggravating factor, such as having put the life or safety of their customers in danger, in which case a 10 year mandatory minimum. We believe this will help to cause the smugglers and the crews that work for them to think twice before targeting Canada for their sordid trade.

We also propose massive new penalties for the shipowners, those who are at the back end of this business enterprise, this terrible criminal profit-making venture. They ought to know that they stand to lose millions of dollars if they acquire a ship to be used for this illicit purpose.

Also, we have broadened the ability to make it easier to obtain successful prosecutions against people smugglers through amendments to the relevant law. We take other measures targeting the smugglers very clearly.

However, when we are talking about an illicit market, one thing history, common experience and economics all tell us is that as long as there is a sufficient demand and a sufficient price, there will always be someone willing to provide a service or a good. Therefore, we cannot be naive about the imperative of diminishing the demand side of the equation in the smuggling enterprise.

We must ask ourselves this. Why are people coming from third world countries paying $50,000 to come to Canada in this dangerous way?

Some of the people we are talking about are actually coming from democracies like India. Recently CBC News did a report on individuals in Tamil Nadu in Chennai in the great Indian democracy who had paid smugglers to come to Canada. One of them wanted to come to Canada because he or she had heard this country provided free monthly salaries. In part, there is an economic pull factor to Canada.

It is clear to us that the capacity of someone who lands in Canada, for example, a positive refugee protection decision, to immediately then sponsor family members, means that the $50,000 price point used by the syndicates is not just an investment on the principal applicant getting into the country, but on those family members who will then follow. Therefore, $50,000 makes sense on the smuggling market because the price point actually will eventually allow several family members to come to Canada in reasonably short order.

That is one of the reasons why it is important to change the business model of these smuggling syndicates by disincentivizing. This is why we propose that those who have been designated to have arrived in a smuggling event and who get a positive protection decision would have temporary residency in Canada for a period of five years. I would be happy to develop that further on questions.

Combating Terrorism Act

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Madam Speaker, it is almost a cliché to say that the events of September 11, 2001 changed the world, but Professor Wayne MacKay, a professor at Dalhousie law school, wrote in a article called “Human Rights in the Global Village” that this was only partly true because:

—terrorism has been an international force for many years. However, on September 11, 2001 the reality of terrorism was visited on the heartland of the United States and it became clear to all that even a super power was vulnerable to the forces of terrorism afoot in the world. The world may not really have changed as a result of “9/11”, but the way that the United States, and by association Canada, approach the world did. We have become more cautious and national security has become a value that trumps most other values--including human rights.

Like most people, I have a very vivid recollection of where I was when the planes hit the Twin Towers in New York City. I was starting my first week at Dalhousie law school and was in the student lounge, which was packed with other students. We were all utterly silent.

I am not really one for numbers. I can never remember if it is Bill C-11 or Bill C-392 or Bill C-9 in the 40th Parliament or the 38th Parliament, but I remember Bill C-36, the Anti-terrorism Act that was introduced in 2001. I remember it like I remember 9/11 because even though I was a fresh-faced law student eager to learn about this great big concept called the law, a concept based on human rights, justice and fundamental freedoms, I still knew that Bill C-36 was a departure from that base of justice and human rights.

As first-year law students, a group of us started a student association called SALSA, the Social Activist Law Student Association. SALSA was and continues to be, and it is still at Dalhousie law school, the coming together of like-minded students who are interested in seeking justice, environmental, social and economic justice. We want to see it realized in our communities.

When Bill C-36 was introduced in 2001, we did not know what to do, but we knew we had to do something. Therefore, we organized a panel of human rights and justice criminal law experts to talk about the bill and educate us on what was exactly going on and what the bill was trying to accomplish. Some of us wrote letters to the editor, others wrote op eds and we wrote to our members of Parliament.

There was a growing consensus then that the dangers of Bill C-36 were that it would trump our human rights and civil liberties in the face of national security and allow for government to act in the shadows shrouded in mystery and secrecy. However, the one thing everybody hung their hats on was the fact that there was a sunset clause in the act. That was the first time I had even heard the term “sunset clause”. The idea was that after a period of time, a review of the legislation would automatically be triggered by Parliament.

The current bill, Bill C-17, proposes amendments to the Criminal Code that would reinstate provisions from the Anti-terrorism Act of 2001 that expired under that very sunset clause in 2007. Very specifically, the bill relates to investigative hearings whereby individuals who may have information about a terrorism offence, whether it is in the past or the future, can be compelled to attend a hearing and answer questions. No one attending a hearing can refuse to answer a question on the grounds of self-incrimination, which is quite different than if someone is in a court facing Criminal Code charges.

The other issue is preventive arrest whereby individuals can be arrested without a warrant in order to prevent them from carrying out a terrorist act. It is detention based on what someone might do. The arrested individual has to be brought before a judge within 24 hours, which is fair, or as soon as feasible and the judge determines whether that individual can be released unconditionally or with certain conditions for up to 12 months. Also, if those conditions are refused, the person can be imprisoned for up to 12 months.

International human rights and domestic human rights are increasingly related when we look at the global village of today. What we do in Canada affects the greater and wider world and our actions have worldwide implications. Similarly, actions outside of Canada's borders can and do have an impact here.

As Greg Walton wrote in a piece for the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development:

Canada has an obligation to provide a model; we need to stand straight lest we cast a crooked shadow.

After my graduation from law school, I had the opportunity to work with Professor Wayne MacKay doing research and assisting with his preparation for the lecture that I spoke about, as well as his appearance before the Senate committee actually reviewing the anti-terrorism legislation back in 2005. While I was working with him, one topic of conversation that we kept coming back to was the idea of racial profiling.

Racial profiling has been defined by the Ontario Human Rights Commission, which is a really good definition, as follows:

...any action undertaken for reasons of safety, security or public protection that relies on stereotypes about race, colour, ethnicity, ancestry, religion or place of origin rather than on reasonable suspicion, to single out an individual for greater scrutiny or different treatment.

Professor MacKay pointed out that before September 11 the issue of racial profiling was really about driving while black. A stark example of this comes from my home province of Nova Scotia with the story of Kirk Johnson, a boxer whose case appeared before the Nova Scotia Human Rights Tribunal. When Mr. Johnson was repeatedly, over years, pulled over by police in his expensive car with Texas licence plates, the tribunal found that actually race was a determining factor in the police's decision to pull him over again and again.

Since September 11, that phrase, driving while black, has actually been recoined as flying while Arab. Profiling is broader than just race now. It takes into account religion, culture and even ideology. Concerns about profiling based on race, culture or religion are real but they are accentuated by threats of terror. There is an alarming tendency to paint an entire group with one brush when in fact it is the act of individuals rather than religious or ethnic groups that are at fault.

We know about the uproar in the United States with the proposed building of a mosque six blocks from the site of the World Trade Centre. We think that kind of thing certainly could not happen here but here at home, on the day after the arrests of 17 terrorist suspects in Ontario, windows were broken at an Islamic mosque in Toronto. It can happen here and it does happen here.

At the Senate committee hearings in 2005 actually reviewing the Anti-terrorism Act, Canadian Muslim and Arab groups argued that if law enforcement agents were going to use profiling in their investigations, profiling needed to be based on behaviour, not ethnicity or religion. However, in a Globe and Mail article, a member of this House on the government side cited a different opinion when he said, “(y)ou don't send the anti-terrorist squad to investigate the Amish or the Lutheran ladies. You go where you think the risk is”.

Within the context of Bill C-17, we need to think about the real danger of imposing a sentence. I know it is not a sentence in the strict criminal terms of what a sentence is, but it is a 12-month sentence in prison based on something someone thinks a person might do. We can layer that with the fact that we know profiling is happening in Canada.

We know the Criminal Code works. We know there are provisions in the Criminal Code for a wide range of charges related to anti-terrorism. It is working. How do we know that? It is because these proposed sections that we are talking about in Bill C-17 have never been used. Therefore, why would we take that risk?

We have anti-terrorism legislation that has proven to be useful. The reason that these two provisions have never been used and were not renewed at the end of the sunset clauses is that they did not meet that balance between national security and human rights and civil liberties. There is a reason they expired with the sunset clause and there is absolutely no reason for us to bring them back to life today.

Balanced Refugee Reform Act

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Trinity—Spadina did significant work in committee on the process that led to Bill C-11 being adopted. Certain themes are very dear to her. She was instrumental in helping me convince other committee members of the importance of an appeal division for everyone. She even put a bit of pressure on our Liberal friends to ensure that they support our position. She was also quite concerned about the issue of allowing permanent residence applications on humanitarian grounds for refugee status claimants.

Could the hon. member explain to this House the importance of this mechanism as a safety net for those who do not exactly fit into the definition of refugee status?

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, refugee laws have the ability to define a nation and sometimes it is not obvious until decades later.

Had the former prime minister of Canada, Mackenzie King, eased up on the refugee laws at the time, several hundred thousand Jews might have been saved from the Nazis.

Hiding behind the argument of the national self-interest of Canada, then immigration minister Thomas Crerar, with his official Fred Blair, barred Jews from entering Canada. Mr. Blair said it was “for the reason that coming out of the maelstrom of war, some of them are liable to go on the rocks”--he was talking about refugees--“and when they become public charges, we have to keep them for the balance of their lives”.

Between 1933 and 1945 the United States under Roosevelt accepted 200,000 Jewish refugees. England accepted 70,000. Bolivia, a relatively poor country, accepted 14,000. Sadly and shamefully, Canada, a rich and vast country, accepted only 5,000 Jewish refugees.

Even the young Pierre Elliott Trudeau, in an election rally in November 1942, stated that he feared “the peaceful invasion of immigrants more than the armed invasion of the enemy”, an obvious reference to Jews.

It was only when the Jewish community through the People's Committee Against Anti-Semitism protest action that Canada began to ease its refugee policies. The people's committee sent a delegation to Ottawa representing 10,000 Canadian Jews and met with minister Crerar. Because of the huge and sustained outcry, finally in 1944, 450 Jewish refugees were allowed into Canada.

By 1945, the 972 very highly skilled, professional male refugees who had been in jail since 1940 were finally released from jail and became a professional pool of musicians, teachers, artists, writers, theologians and scientists.

Why do I bring up the history? Because establishing a fair and humane refugee policy is very difficult. Oftentimes doing the right thing is not necessarily the most popular thing to do and any mistakes made can result in beatings, torture, jail, and sometimes death.

There is an important lesson to be learned from that dark chapter of our history. We have to work with the people who are most affected, people who work with refugees, and then the government laws and policy will be perfected.

Today, in these difficult times, many refugees have to leave their countries because they suffer persecution. Last year, 43.3 million people faced persecution because of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion. They were forcibly displaced worldwide. This is the highest number of people uprooted by conflict and persecution since the mid-1990s and represents more than our country's population. If Canada makes a mistake and we end up turning away some of these people, it could be a matter of life and death.

That is why we must learn from that dark history and provide fast and safe entry for genuine refugee claimants and turn away those who are trying to exploit Canada's system.

New Democrats have always supported the creation of a fast, fair and effective refugee system. When this bill was first presented, we said we feared that no country is truly free from any form of persecution, whether it is hate crimes directed toward gays and lesbians, and transsexual people, or a woman fleeing domestic violence, genital mutilation, or an honour killing. Those countries may be democratic but they are not safe.

We are very pleased that people from those countries will now have the same rights of appeal. They will have the rights for humanitarian and compassionate consideration and the right to counsel.

That is why we are extremely glad that we are fast-tracking Bill C-11. We are compressing the timeline for report stage and third reading into one afternoon to give the bill fast passage so that the bill can become law, hopefully by the end of this month, or maybe even before the end of this month.

Allowing people to have humanitarian and compassionate consideration is critically important. Sometimes refugees may not know whether they belong in the refugee stream or the humanitarian stream. This is now built in and it is protected.

There are also extremely important regulations coming with the bill. We look forward to seeing them come into force. We are looking forward to the hiring of close to 100 refugee protection officers to clear the backlog. I believe there are over 60,000 claimants who have been waiting in limbo for close to four years for a decision. The Canada Border Services Agency's computer system will be upgraded. Those who are ordered to leave the country will be tracked by CBSA so they could be asked to leave Canada without Canada losing track of them.

New Democrats presented over 20 recommendations during the discussion at the citizenship and immigration committee. We would have preferred to see some other changes. For example, in the beginning we were quite uncomfortable with the interview process because the personal interview forms would no longer be used. We were worried about the cost of the humanitarian and compassionate application fees of over $500. We were worried that new information may not be able to be submitted to the refugee appeal division.

We were also worried that if countries had a last minute change and if refugees were deported to those countries, without the pre-removal assessment review, the refugees could face real problems when they returned home.

We also wanted all the clauses to come into force at the same time and that there be a built-in evaluation process. However, in the spirit of working together and of making compromises to make a better bill, I withdrew my recommendations in support of the humanitarian and compassionate grounds consideration, and allowing appeals for all refugee claimants and making sure that all claimants have a right to counsel. Those are things that we believe are extremely important.

Did we get everything that we wanted? No, however, it is a bill that is far more balanced. We believe when it becomes law, it will be worthy of celebration because at long last we will see the implementation of the refugee appeal division.

I want to thank people for the hundreds and hundreds of submissions that we received at committee. People took the time to write about the kind of changes they wanted to see. We heard from refugees themselves. It was extremely brave for them to describe their experiences and how happy and safe they feel now that they are in Canada.

We also heard from passionate refugee advocates who described their work with refugees and urged the committee members to we pass a bill that was balanced, fair and fast. They organized public meetings in Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal and many other parts of Canada and allowed people to speak out.

Our committee could not travel because we did not have the time, but we were able to hear from quite a large number of people through the Internet and video conferencing. Because of their wisdom, their persistence and their insistence that democracy means calling their member of Parliament when a bill needs to be improved, they did call us. I understand that a lot of members of Parliament received submissions, calls and visitations from people who have worked with refugees or refugees themselves.

That, in itself, was extremely precious because at the end of the day, when we come together collectively, whether we are refugees, refugee advocates, immigrants, organizations, members of Parliament, critics, the minister and his staff or public officials, the key component is that we must listen to each other and work together because we do want, collectively, the same thing, which is a fair and fast refugee determination process.

I hope that passing this law will mean that we will not repeat the tragic past of many years ago when we saw 907 refugees on board the St. Louis being sent away which resulted in half of them perishing. That is a lesson that we need to remind ourselves of over and over again as we talk about refugees and immigration issues because we do not want that terrible history to repeat itself. Canada is really a safe haven for many people seeking to make their homes in Canada and today, because we are passing a balanced, fair and fast refugee process, we have a lot to celebrate together.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Of course not, Mr. Speaker. It is common knowledge that the Bloc members are never satisfied and that we always want more for Quebec. Of course we will not stop today.

More seriously, I mentioned this briefly and I am happy to have been asked the question so that I can come back to it in more detail. I believe that we should have found a way to include a provision about reopening files in cases where a person's situation has changed drastically after the final decision had been made. And this option should be available until the person has been deported.

I know that in terms of numbers, it does not represent many people. I am conscious of the fact that the system put forward in Bill C-11 is robust and will allow fewer cases to slip through the cracks. There will not be many errors of this type.

I also know that there are other voluntary mechanisms in place that allow the ministers to act in extremely specific cases. We know that in the past, immigration ministers were hesitant to use this type of mechanism. I would have liked to see something in writing—and not just another step that anyone could access—something that would have allowed a person in an unforeseen and unprecedented situation to ask, at the very least, to have their file reopened. Then, after a cursory study, we could tell them if there was a major change or if there was an extraordinary element that would result in reopening the file.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will start with the first bit, on the satisfaction we derive, as members of the committee, from having done our job properly. This just goes to show that the members in this House, first and foremost, have a desire to make changes and improve things. We all know that, in terms of winning over voters, few of our constituents are watching today or will be rushing out to congratulate us on the changes to clause 17 of Bill C-11. We know that we are doing this because we believe it must be done. People put their trust in us and sent us to Ottawa. They do not follow our deliberations daily, but they ask that we act professionally and that we do our jobs properly, and when we succeed at that, we can obviously be proud.

Now, as for the designated countries, I am adamant that we must not use the term safe. There could be countries that are on the line, but would not want not to be considered a safe country by Canada because that would hurt their image. My concern is that these countries would push to get on the list, and that we would end up needlessly expediting files of people from those countries, when in fact we should be looking at them more closely.

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, Vaughan, ON]

Mr. Speaker, first, I begin by expressing my heartfelt gratitude to the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration for the leadership he has demonstrated throughout this process of turning our commitment to refugee reform into reality. His openness to change, his ability to seize the one in a generation opportunity to deal with a sensitive and often difficult area of public policy is to be commended. It is proof that in our vocation, when we answer the call of public service, we can achieve great objectives for the sole purpose of demonstrating the fact that we are not in this place for some vanity trip or the power of self-indulgence. Rather we are here to bring about positive change to the lives of people and a great willingness to do good for society and show respect for our democratic institute and indeed the democracy within which we live in our country.

Throughout this process the minister has demonstrated a great capacity and work ethic as well as political know-how and leadership. It is not always easy to negotiate. Sometimes it can be quite difficult. People have certain views on issues and they express them openly and sometimes forcefully, because that is part and parcel of what democracy is truly all about.

I want to underline the fact that the minister's willingness to share the credit with his fellow members of Parliament on both sides of the House of all political stripes really speaks to his generosity of spirit and dignity as a parliamentarian. For that, I want to express my gratitude for all he has done.

This issue really began over a year ago, in March of last year, when I asked the question of the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration in relationship to some of the major challenges that the refugee system in Canada was facing and had faced for a while. The issue of backlogs, for example, and many others were brought to light by an Auditor General's report that had some major concerns about Canada's refugee system and we needed to do something very quickly to rectify this issue.

Conversations took place with my caucus colleagues a number of times throughout this process to see how we could better improve the legislation. The minister in his answer essentially said that he would welcome discussions about the refugee system and really opened up a sincere dialogue between members of the opposition, myself included, and his department. He was actually very much involved in ensuring the concerns that were raised by my caucus, for example, were addressed in our own conversations about how to better address some of the challenges. The minister in his speech has really covered all the areas that we needed to address and he also clearly has outlined the concerns.

I am speaking at length about the process today, as we reflect on Bill C-11, because what is very evident to me, and I am sure to members of the committee who worked diligently on this and to everyone who cares about the refugee determination system in Canada, is that if there is a sense that there are issues that need to be dealt with in Parliament in a very open way, and if we, as parliamentarians, have the political will to bring about positive change, things can be achieved.

I read with interest an editorial in the Toronto Star, and this is a headline I am sure the minister will treasure for a while:

Miracle deal on the Hill.

Political miracles are still possible on Parliament Hill.

It ends by saying:

The real miracle would be to transform this isolated incident into standard operating procedure.

I think we need to reflect upon that. We need to reflect upon the fact that minority governments can produce great legislation. However, there has to be an openness. There has to be an openness to dialogue. The answer really does not lie in shouting at one another but rather in putting thoughts on paper, discussing, and being open to changes that may even mean giving up some things that are very dear to you.

When we look at what I hope will become a case study of Bill C-11, I hope, with all due respect to other ministers in the government, that they take a page from the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to see how they could facilitate a better performance of Parliament.

I can speak at length about the changes, the significant amendments that were made, but I am underlining the issue of co-operation, because I sense that it is what Canadians are really seeking. Canadians are seeking from Parliament a new style, a new way of doing things. They look at us, and they want to know that when we rise in the House, we are not thinking only about our own personal agenda. It goes beyond personality. Rather, it goes to the core of what proper representation in the House is truly all about. We can, as a House of Parliament, get up every morning with the ultimate reality in our minds, and that is that we need to come up with the best possible policy available to deal with the challenges Canadians face.

As I look at some of the significant amendments to Bill C-11 that were already mentioned by the minister, whether it was the Liberal Party pushing very hard on the humanitarian and compassionate applications, whether it was the work of the NDP and the Bloc on designated countries, whether it was the member for Vaughan, if I can refer to myself, pushing for changes to timelines on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, or whether it was dealing with the minister—and may I say that receiving an e-mail at 2 a.m. or 4 a.m. was common during these negotiations—it speaks to a willingness to get things done.

As we look down the list of humanitarian and compassionate changes, timelines, the financial commitment of over $540 million made by the government, we can see that this is serious. We answered the call of Canadians. We answered the call of concerned individuals and organizations that deal with refugees. We answered the call of individual Canadians, who felt that our refugee system was, quite frankly, being abused. They wanted parliamentarians in the House to stand up for our country, for the dignity of our system, and for the integrity of our system. This is a bill that goes in the right direction. It is a thoughtful bill. It is a bill that in its original form was a bit flawed. However, with the work of parliamentarians on both sides, we were able to achieve positive change.

When we looked at the advisory panel, when we looked at the trigger points to designate countries, which was a major issue in my caucus, as some members may recall, eventually, we found solutions.

The minister, in his wisdom, when he found that a certain partner was not at the table, sought other partners. At the end of the day, the minister and the country got what we needed. That is more important than a political victory.

What is important is that we, as parliamentarians, have been able to deliver to the people of Canada what is rightly theirs: a bill and a policy that addresses their key concerns. It addresses those things they care about, those issues they talk about around the kitchen table, those concerns of families, of refugees, who have to wait years upon years for a decision to be rendered. Now they will not have to.

If this system works well, what we will need to remember is that public life is about people, at the end of the day. If we can relieve the pain that some of these individuals have felt over the years because of a flawed system, then we have done our job. If we can stand up as parliamentarians and say that we have a refugee system that has elevated Canada's status as a system that is fair, that is just, and that allows individuals to come to our country to seek refuge, then we have done our job.

Upon reflection, as we think of the process of that very first question to the minister, of his openness in his response, of the work done by members of Parliament on all sides, of the agreements and disagreements, and of the tension, and may I say, today, the relaxation, we begin to comprehend in a very real way that positive change in this chamber is indeed possible. Things can, in fact, happen for the better.

There are many refugees who have come to this country who have made great contributions. They have enriched the cultural fibre, the economic fibre, of our country. We welcome them with open arms, because we have a responsibility, as people in one of the greatest democracies on earth, to play our role as parliamentarians. We engage in an international and global society, a global village, where countries and citizens need one another to create the type of global environment in which we mutually benefit from each other and mutually benefit from the gifts we have been given.

I want to particularly say that from a governance point of view, Bill C-11 represents a good model to follow, because although we have certain views and some very strong views on issues, I think that the give-and-take is extremely important in the creation of good public policy.

There is a reason refugee reform is often not touched. It is difficult. It is sensitive. It is, at times, politically charged. People want to avoid that. However, I think that this citizenship and immigration committee has really demonstrated leadership in ensuring that these changes the minister stated in his speech were achieved.

As a final comment, I would like to see more of this in the House. I would like to see more Bill C-11s in the House. I want to see ministers who are just as open. I want to see opposition members who are just as forceful and aggressive and who care about people. In the final analysis, when we make our contribution to public life, we need to look back and ask if we made a difference in people's lives.

If the answer is yes, as is the case in Bill C-11, it is definitely a good day for Parliament. It is a good day for politicians. It is a good day for all parties involved. It speaks to the fact that when we gather our energies and focus on an issue of common purpose with good will and faith, we can succeed.

On a final note, during my negotiations, I was helped a great deal by a young man named Vince Haraldsen who works in the office of the Leader of the Opposition. I want to thank him. Obviously, I want to thank the chair, my neighbour from Caledon, for his great work, and all members of the committee. I express to all of them my sincerest gratitude for what has been a great experience.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased this bill is in front of us. I have two areas on which I will ask questions.

First, often with legislation, unless we have the best public servants to implement it, sometimes there can be problems. During the committee, we had a lot of discussion as to how the hiring process would take place. Would the minister briefly describe how people of the highest merits will be hired and how it will be a very transparent process?

Second, when the bill comes into force and the regulations, spending will be needed to create the refugee appeal division and to hire staff for it. Could the minister give us a description on his plan on implementing Bill C-11 and also the hiring process?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

moved that Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, be read the third time and passed.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commence third reading of Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act, which would reform Canada's asylum system to make it both faster and fairer. I encourage all hon. members to support the bill.

I am pleased to report that the proposed reforms in the original version of Bill C-11 received widespread support. However, many concerns were raised in good faith by parliamentarians and others concerned about Canada's asylum system. We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

These amendments, I am happy to say, create a reform package that is both faster and fairer than the bill as it was originally tabled.

There is a remarkable spirit of co-operation around this bill. It is amazing to see that a consensus could be reached on such a sensitive issue by all the parties in the House with their divergent views.

I will just add that I have been here for some 14 years and in a minority Parliament for several years. It is very seldom that we see all parties working together on anything. To have seen all parties come together, following a diligent and serious debate on this very complex matter of policy that involves people's lives, is truly remarkable. It is a commendation to all Canadians that, indeed, notwithstanding the political differences here, at least from time to time this minority Parliament can work and, in this case, it has worked. That only happened because of the diligence and good faith of those parliamentarians who worked most closely on the bill. I commend, in particular, my parliamentary secretary, the member for St. Catharines.

I would like to acknowledge the tremendous efforts of the Bloc’s immigration critic, the hon. member for Jeanne-Le Ber, who demonstrated an incredible knowledge of these reforms and this aspect of our legislation. He was open to an agreement, which was really unexpected at the start of the process.

It is rather rare for a so-called ordinary member to have an opportunity to implement an idea taken from a private member’s bill. The hon. member for Jeanne-Le Ber proposed a bill to implement the appeal division of the Immigration and Refugee Board. That was rejected by the House because it was not part of a larger reform of the asylum granting system.

Thanks to his tenacity and dedication, Bill C-11 gives all rejected asylum seekers access to a new appeal division. This is thanks to his efforts. I would like to salute him and thank him for his remarkable efforts.

I would like to acknowledge the great efforts and remarkable spiritedness and diligence of my colleague from Trinity—Spadina, who is a long-standing spokesperson for refugees, for people who are in need of our protection. She brought a great deal of compassion to this debate but also a tremendous knowledge of the complex details of refugee policy. To quote my new favourite newspaper, the Toronto Star, the fact that the member for Trinity—Spadina and I could come to an agreement on a matter as delicate as refugee reform is nothing short of a miracle. Miracles happen.

I would also like to acknowledge the efforts of the member for Vaughan, the official opposition immigration critic, who first raised this issue last spring, in March 2009. He worked with us in good faith to advance the cause of a fair and fast asylum system. I regret that he ran into some internal political difficulties in his own caucus.

Not to sour the note, there was at least one member of this place, the member for Bourassa, who was not exactly representative of the kind of consensual approach that has characterized this bill. In fact, he engaged in the kind of lowbrow demagoguery that really has no place in debates on immigration, suggesting that this positive reform would “build walls around Canada”. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In point of fact, the reforms that this bill will allow us to implement will lead to a 20% increase in the number of resettled UN refugees, who we will welcome to our shores, victims of ethnic cleansing, warfare or persecution. There will be some 2,500 a year, year after year, who will find the certainty of Canada's protection and to whom we will be giving protection, thanks to these reforms, thanks to the broadmindedness, the soft-heartedness but also the hard-headedness of members from all sides.

We have been able to bring about these reforms that will help to save 2,500 additional lives every year as we welcome more resettled refugees and give them more support for their successful integration. This bill does not build walls around Canada, as the member suggested in a fit of demagoguery. Rather, it breaks walls down so that Canada can be true to its vocation as a place of protection and refuge for those most in need of it.

We can all be proud of the Canadian asylum granting system, although all the parties acknowledge that it is typified by extensive backlogs and lengthy processing delays. This is not a temporary situation that arose just recently. It is typical of a broken system that has been that way for a long time.

I do not need to belabour the point. We all recognize the system in many respects is broken, with a 60,000 person backlog taking 20 months for an initial protection decision, with some nearly 60% of claims being rejected, with our number one source country, a European Union democracy, from which 97% of claimants go on to abandon or withdraw their own claims. Therefore, it is imperative that we find a way to deter abuse so that those who really need protection get that protection faster and those who seek to abuse Canada's generosity are removed from this country much more quickly.

That is what Bill C-11 would achieve. The bill and its related regulatory and operational reforms would create a new information-gathering interview at the independent Immigration and Refugee Board early in the claims process. It would put in place independent decision makers at the Refugee Protection Division of the IRB who are not political appointees. They in fact would be appointed according to a transparent process. It would create a new fact-based refugee appeal division.

This is something that refugee advocates and more especially the hon. member for Jeanne-Le Ber have been demanding for years.

It would create the certainty of Canada's protection for bona fide refugees in about four months rather than the current 19 months. It would allow for the removal of false claimants in about a year rather than several years under the status quo, which would yield about $1.8 billion in savings for Canadian taxpayers.

It would allow for the possibility to fast track the processing of claims from designated countries, as well as the identification and expedited processing of manifestly unfounded or fraudulent claims. It would create a new pilot program of assisted voluntary removals for failed claimants. It would invest $540 million in new resources for the refugee system, including the enhancements to resettlement from abroad that I mentioned.

As I mentioned at the outset, the government was open to the idea of making thoughtful improvements that would help achieve what I believe we all want: a quick, fair asylum granting system.

During second reading of Bill C-11 in the House of Commons, I listened to all the speeches. During the debates and consultations, the government took constructive criticism into account and recognized the need to work together with the opposition to design a bill that reflected the parliamentary consensus.

The reforms we are proposing should have been implemented long ago. They would have enabled us to use our resources to protect people who really need it.

Bill C-11 would put in place authority to develop a designated country of origin list. This list would include countries with a strong record of human rights and protection of their citizens and that are not normally refugee producing, probably in the end, no more than a handful of countries.

We need such a tool to deal with large spikes in unfounded claims from typically safe democratic countries, claims that are often later abandoned or withdrawn, suggesting that claimants may not have been in need of our protection in the first place. I am confident that we will seize the opportunity before us to implement these reforms.

As the IRB presently delivers the majority of risk assessment making through the Refugee Protection Division, and additionally the refugee appeal division under Bill C-11, the IRB is the logical organization in which to centralize the function of risk assessment, which we have done through an amendment to the original bill, moving the pre-removal risk assessment for failed asylum claimants to the IRB.

The government has also heard the concerns expressed by a wide range of stakeholders regarding the proposed deadlines. To respond to those concerns, we have agreed to move the deadlines back, to 15 days instead of eight for the initial interview by the information gatherer that is being incorporated in the Act, and to 90 days instead of 60 for the initial hearing, which will be incorporated in the regulations in the section dealing with processing times in the Refugee Appeal Division.

The deadlines proposed for the interview and the subsequent hearing are reasonable, realistic and fair, and for certain exceptions, in particular in cases where there is evidence of trauma or vulnerability, the officers handling the interviews would have the power to adjourn an interview.

The decision-makers at the first-level hearings will be trained in accordance with the same standards as are used in the present system and hired in accordance with the values of the public service: merit, transparency, access, representativeness and fairness.

The government has worked with our colleagues in other parties to make further changes to our policy direction with respect to the designated country approach. These changes are reflected in amendments passed by the standing committee with support from all parties. We have accepted an amendment from our colleagues in the Bloc that gives claimants from designated countries access to the refugee appeal division while ensuring even faster processing of their claims than was originally proposed in Bill C-11.

The amended designated country provisions maintain the intent of our policy to more quickly process and remove claimants from designated countries. Criteria for the purposes of designation have also been included in the legislation. These include the volume of claims from that country, the acceptance rate at the IRB for claims from that country, the human rights record of that country and the availability of avenues for seeking protection and redress in that country.

While a review would be conducted against all four criteria, the amendments ensure that the quantitative thresholds established in regulations actually trigger the review. In other words, a review for designation could only take place if certain quantitative thresholds established in regulations are met. Countries that do not meet this threshold would not be reviewed. Manifestly unfounded claims would also be a factor in country designation decisions and would be reflected in regulations.

I would like to express my thanks to the member for Jeanne-Le Ber, because he was the one who heard the experts and the other people who actually came up with idea that was seriously considered and approved by the standing committee. This is a very flexible tool for dealing with fraud when it arises in our refugee protection system.

Manifestly unfounded claims would also be a factor, as I have said. The concept of the manifestly unfounded claim is well established with the UNHCR and is focused upon cases which are clearly fraudulent in nature.

These amendments provide for greater transparency around the criteria that will have to be met to designate a country, and also clearly limit the powers of the minister.

Regulations would also require that a designation can only be made if an advisory panel including at least two independent human rights experts recommends it.

These amendments go a long way in providing greater clarity and transparency around the process of designation.

Amendments also propose to schedule a hearing for designated country claimants earlier than for other claimants, within 60 days of the initial interview, as opposed to 90 days.

The bill also proposes that the refugee appeal division would hear an appeal from a failed claimant from a designated country within 30 days following an application, as opposed to the 120 days for claimants from other countries.

With these amendments, the same policy objective would be achieved but by speeding up processing timeframes rather than denying access to the new RAD at the IRB, which was initially proposed in Bill C-11.

As well, faster processing, including prioritization of failed designated country claimants for removals, would ensure that designated country claimants could not stay in Canada for long periods of time.

The government further proposed an amendment to allow the RAD to expedite the appeal of a claim that is determined to be manifestly unfounded, that is to say, essentially fraudulent claims. This would ensure that appeals of such claims would take place in the same expedited timeframe applied to failed claimants from designated countries.

Manifestly unfounded claims would have 15 days to file an appeal at the RAD and appeals would be considered within 30 days of the filing. The processing time standard at the front end, however, would be the same as for claimants from other countries, 15 days for the information-gathering interview and 90 days for hearings following that interview.

This new provision would respond to spikes in fraudulent claims more quickly than would the designated country designation.

Also under the proposed amendments, if either designated country or manifestly unfounded claimants chose also to apply for judicial review, their removals would not be stayed and they would be subject to priority removal.

With these amendments we would still be providing fast protection decisions for those in need with quality first-level decisions by an independent quasi-judicial body. We would continue to provide for expedited processing of claims from designated countries without denying the claimants access to an appeal.

In fact, we would actually do a bit better under these proposed reforms and amendments than the bill as originally tabled. Claims from designated countries would be processed in an estimated 120 days, about half of the processing time of most claims and about 10 times faster than under the status quo.

Claims determined to be manifestly unfounded would have the same arrangement for expedited appeal as designated country claimants.

We have also agreed to other amendments which clarify the existing policy and respond to certain concerns that have been raised, including the fact that considerations associated with undue hardship would continue to be examined in applications on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

The risk assessment under sections 96 and 97 of the act would be eliminated from that process, as initially proposed, to avoid redundancies in the refugee protection system.

With the exception of the committee's decision to eliminate the one-year time limit for access to applications on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, I will be happy to say that I completely approve of the amendments approved by the committee.

With respect to the limitation on humanitarian and compassionate applications, the government continues to believe that these measures would contribute to the overall effectiveness of the system and deter abuse.

In general, however, the amendments proposed would continue to enable us to achieve our objectives of expediting processing, deterring abuse and giving claimants access to the Refugee Appeal Division.

As I said earlier, the amendments are actually an improvement from the original proposal, a real and unique win-win situation for all involved in this debate and for legitimate claimants as well as for Canadian taxpayers. That is because the fast-track process would be even faster than our original timelines.

I look forward to taking questions on the technical aspects of the bill and the associated regulations.

Let me close by thanking all parliamentarians and members of the committee who so diligently exercised their true role as legislators and for giving evidence and hope to Canadians that we can work together to achieve sound public policy.

I thank all of the hard-working officials at Citizenship and Immigration Canada who, quite frankly, have worked on this issue for years and with tremendous diligence in the past several months. I thank as well my own political staffers, particularly my policy director, Mr. James Yousif, who has done remarkable work in advising me and the government and making this day possible.

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I have a number of motions whereby there have been consultations among all parties and I think, if you were to seek it, you would find unanimous consent for them. I will begin with the first one.

I move:

That, notwithstanding any standing order or usual practice of the House, Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, be deemed to have been amended at the report stage as proposed in the report stage motion in the name of the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism on today's notice paper; be deemed concurred in as amended; and that the House be authorized to consider the bill at third reading later today.

(Bill C-11. On the Order: Government Orders:)

June 11, 2010--Concurrence in report stage of Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act--the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

There is no reason to expedite consideration of this bill, first and foremost because up to now the witnesses have been saying, virtually unanimously, that the existing act is working very well, that it is not outdated and doesn't risk causing major problems for society. So we can perfectly well continue to consider the bill as it needs to be considered, with the gravimen required, as all the testimony heard to date has suggested to us that it should be.

As well, and in response to Mr. Norlock, I would refer him to what happened at the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration. For the bill on balanced refugee reform, the Minister heard the witnesses, he heard the opposition parties, he negotiated with the parties and an agreement was reached. So it wasn't that the opposition parties wanted to be obstructionist.

We also want to stand up for our constituents' interests, and we don't all understand our constituents' interests the same way; we do it as best we can. So I reject the idea that because something comes from the government we absolutely have to approve everything without discussing it and taking the time to consider things thoroughly. That is what we're doing with this bill. It affects the lives of thousands of young people who are involved with the Canadian justice system.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the fourth report of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration on Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act. The committee has studied the bill and has decided to report the bill back to the House, with amendments.

Business of the House

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague, the deputy House leader for the Official Opposition, for her questions.

When I get into addressing the issue of the upcoming government legislation that I intend to call, I will make reference to Bill C-34, which was her first additional question. The other question dealt with private member's Bill C-391 and the report that came back from the committee about that legislation. I am sure the member is well aware of the process of private members' business. It has nothing to do with the government business and therefore those negotiations and consultations will take place between yourself, Mr. Speaker, and the sponsor of that legislation.

We will continue today with the opposition motion. Tomorrow we will call Bill C-2, the Canada-Colombia free trade agreement, which is at third reading.

I would also like to designate pursuant to Standing Order 66(2) tomorrow as the day to complete the debate on the motion to concur in the third report of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

Next week we will hopefully complete all stages of Bill C-34, Creating Canada's New National Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 Act. I would like to thank the opposition parties for their support of that legislation and for allowing it to pass expeditiously when we do call it.

There may also be some interest to do something similar for Bill C-24, First Nations Certainty of Land Title Act; Bill S-5, ensuring safe vehicles; and Bill S-9, tracking auto theft and property crime act.

I would also like to complete the remaining stages of Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act.

In addition to those bills, I would call Bill C-23, Eliminating Pardons for Serious Crimes Act; Bill S-2, Protecting Victims From Sex Offenders Act; and Bill C-22, Protecting Children from Online Sexual Exploitation Act.

I would also like to announce that on Monday we will be having a take note debate on the subject of the measures being taken to address the treatment of multiple sclerosis. I will be moving the appropriate motion at the end of my statement.

Pursuant to Standing Order 66(2) I would like to designate Tuesday, June 15, as the day to conclude debate on the motion to concur in the first report of the Standing Committee on International Trade.

Finally, I would like to designate Thursday, June 17, as the last allotted day.

At this time I will be making a number of motions and asking for the unanimous consent of the House for them, starting with the take note debate motion.

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

I'm in favour of speeding things up. The important thing in this act, in my opinion, is for everyone to have the right to appeal and for everyone to be entitled to something that is fair. If we get the impression that the process isn't fair, people may be pleased that the act is passed, but, in five years, we'll be dealing with the problem created by the interpretation of what a designated country is and what a safe country is.

If Bill C-11 isn't adopted, will an immigration minister or government have the opportunity to designate a country?

[Peter MacDougall]

No, I make no distinction. In fact in the G-2 government amendment it introduced the use of the word “safe”, and in the amended BQ-5.1 it moves back to the original language of “designated”, which is in Bill C-11. So I do not make a distinction now.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

There is a group of recommendations, starting with NDP-5, that deal with interviews. The existing law--before Bill C-11--provides for personal information and allows the claimant to describe their own story. They can write their own narrative. This will be replaced by an interviewing process in Bill C-11. I was concerned that the interviewing process would be too rushed and there wouldn't be enough time for legal representation.

However, there are other amendments coming up that increase the first part of the time that will allow claimants to have legal counsel. I'm withdrawing all of my amendments that deal with the interview. There are a few of them. I'll go through them as they come up, but the first is NDP-5.

I have been assured that the interview process will not be harsh, since it will be done by Immigration and Refugee Board officials and staff and not through CBSA. So it will not necessarily be confrontational, and the applicant will have the capacity to get a copy of the tape, etc. So I have been assured that the process will be okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I'm going to call the meeting to order.

This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting number 23, Wednesday, June 9, 2010. The orders for the day are Bill C-11, an act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

We are here today for clause-by-clause consideration. We have with us a number of the staff, who I will not introduce; you've met them all. But if there are questions on different sections or amendments, they can be asked of those people.

Thank you for coming and giving up your time today.

Monsieur Coderre, you have a point of order?

[John Butt]

The original change proposed in Bill C-11 was to grant the refugee appeal division the option of issuing oral decisions at the end of the hearing. It added that; it does not take it away with this amendment. It continues to have that option. But for pre-removal risk assessment applications, the current practice of delivering written decisions through Canada Border Services Agency is intended to be retained.

[John Butt]

Paragraph 169(c) is amended in Bill C-11 to provide that decisions of the refugee appeal division may be issued either orally or in writing. At the end of a hearing, if a hearing is called for under the legislation, there could be an oral decision, or the member, if he needed time to formulate his thoughts, could adjourn the process and issue a decision in writing. The change with respect to the decisions of the refugee protection division on these applications for protection, these pre-removal risk assessment applications, is to retain the current practice of the minister and the department, which is to reduce all of these decisions to writing and have them delivered to the individual in person.

[John Butt]

Subject to the restrictions or bars that are in Bill C-11, the authority of the minister to act on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, even after the pre-removal risk assessment decision has been made, will not have changed.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting 22, Tuesday, June 1, 2010. The orders of the day concern Bill C-11, an act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

This afternoon had originally been scheduled for the committee to review the different clauses in the bill, the clause-by-clause consideration.

We have before us members of the Department of Citizenship and Immigration. I won't introduce them--they've been here so many times--but they are here to offer assistance to the committee on anything that you may wish to pose to them.

As you know, the bells are going to ring at 5:15, so the meeting will end then.

As I understand it, Mr. Dykstra, it's unanimous that we will not proceed with clause-by-clause at this particular time and that members of the committee will have an opportunity to ask the staff questions.

Is that a correct assumption?

[Simon Coakeley]

Pursuant to Bill C-11, the tribunal sets the timeline, under the tribunal's rules. As I explained earlier, we have a consultation process for any new rule that the tribunal seeks. This includes consulting interested parties, for example the Canadian Council for Refugees, lawyers, the Quebec Immigration Lawyers Association, and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. And we will consult them. We know that they have made presentations to this committee.

You know about this exchange of letters. We accept the information or the department's recommendations, but we have to undertake our own consultations before proposing any rules setting out any figure.

[Simon Coakeley, Executive Director, Office of the Executive Director, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.

Thank you for inviting me to come today to speak with you. My name is Simon Coakeley. I was appointed to the position of Executive Director at the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, the IRB, in September 2008. As executive director, I am the most senior public servant at the IRB.

The board's adjudicative support and corporate services staff report directly to me, and I report directly to the chairperson. As mentioned, I am accompanied by François Guilbault, who is here today in his capacity as a senior legal advisor to the IRB. Mr. Guilbault has extensive experience with the Board and is very familiar with the legal aspects underpinning the IRB's operations. He would be pleased to answer legal questions related to Bill C-11.

I trust you have received the submissions from the IRB following Mr. Goodman's appearance before this committee on May 6, 2010. As requested, we provided statistics on refugee decisions, our GIC member complement as well as information on the salary ranges for governor in council appointees and the rates of pay for the current public servant decision-makers in the Immigration Division. And finally we provided a link to the Public Service Commission's report on its audit of the IRB, which includes its recommendations and the board's response.

You have expressed a strong interest in the IRB's approach to the staffing of public servant positions in the new Refugee Protection Division, the RPD. To assist in your deliberations, we have also provided the committee with a copy of a letter the chairperson, Mr. Goodman, recently sent to Maria Barrados, President of the Public Service Commission (PSC) regarding staffing plans and priorities in preparation for the implementation of Bill C-11.

In his letter, Mr. Goodman emphasizes that, while the timing of the coming into force of the new legislation is not yet certain and the IRB has not yet developed detailed staffing strategies, it is clear that passage of the bill will require a major realignment in our personnel over the next couple of years. In addition to the establishment of a new RPD and Refugee Appeal Division, this realignment will necessitate significant changes to some existing IRB roles.

The chairperson advised the PSC that, in implementing these changes within the proposed timeframes, the IRB will need to use the full range of available human resources actions, including internal and external competitive processes, assignments and secondments, deployments and appropriately justified non-advertised processes. In doing so, the board will respect all of its obligations under the Public Service Employment Act, the Public Service Labour Relations Act, applicable collective agreements, as well as the PSC core and guiding values of merit and non-partisanship, fairness, access, representativeness and transparency.

Over the past few weeks, the IRB has watched with interest witnesses who have appeared before this committee, and we have noted the comments that have been raised regarding the hiring of public servant decision-makers in the new RPD and whether or not they will be independent.

I feel it is important for me to reiterate the commitments made by the IRB chairperson before this committee, i.e., to ensure that the public servant decision-makers of the new RPD will be just as competent and independent as our GIC members are today.

The board will continue to employ a rigorous merit-based screening process, in which all candidates will be evaluated on their skills and abilities against various competencies such as: written communication, conceptual thinking, decision-making, judgment, analytical thinking, oral communication, information seeking, organizational skills, orientation, self-control and cultural sensitivity. This highly comprehensive staffing approach will ensure that only suitable and qualified candidates will be hired.

Current IRB decision-makers come from all segments of Canadian society. They include adjudicators or mediators at other tribunals, teachers, community leaders, lawyers, as well as other federal public servants and people with experience working in international humanitarian organizations. This type of diversity ensures that all members bring unique perspectives to their role as decision-makers, and this makes our adjudicative system stronger.

In order to ensure that we continue to benefit from such diversity within our group of decision-makers, we will proceed with simultaneous recruitment drives both inside and outside the public service, as Mr. Goodman indicated two weeks ago.

Once hired, all decision-makers, whether GIC appointees or public servants, will be provided with an extensive, world-renowned training program. The IRB training program is recognized internationally, as well as by the Federal Court of Canada and the Auditor General, for its thoroughness and professionalism. In addition, new members' performance during the orientation and training period will be assessed before they are permitted to preside over hearings on their own, with additional customized training provided where necessary.

The public servant decision-makers of the new RPD will be subject to the same code of conduct that applies to GIC and Immigration Division public servant decision-makers currently. The code establishes the standards of conduct that govern the professional and ethical responsibilities of members of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, as decision-makers of a quasi-judicial administrative tribunal. New RPD decision-makers will be bound by this same code of conduct.

The fact is that we already have an Immigration Division that is staffed by independent public servant decision-makers, and we have every confidence that we have the tools, practices, mechanisms and training in place to ensure that this adjudicative independence will continue as we transition to the new system.

As you heard from Mr. Goodman, when he was here on May 6, the IRB began preliminary implementation planning immediately following the tabling of Bill C-11 at the end of March.

To briefly bring you up to date, the week before last, a group of IRB personnel met in Toronto to start mapping out the new process that would need to be put in place from the referral of a claim to the RPD decision, with a particular focus on how the interview function would work. A similar group met in Ottawa last week to do the same thing for the new RAD processes. A lot of good ideas were generated, but it's still too early for us to make final decisions on which ones we will actually implement, because we are fully aware that the details of the legislation may be amended.

For us, the real work to prepare for implementation can only get under way once Bill C-11 receives royal assent in Parliament and transition funding is released. At that point, we will develop rules, finalize work descriptions and accountability profiles for all of the new positions to be created, launch staffing processes, secure office space, and so forth.

I'd like to take a minute to touch briefly on the rule-making process. Rules are one type of policy articulated by the board. Rules, like regulations, are binding. The rules will establish the procedures that must be followed in the refugee protection division, including the timelines for the information-gathering interview and the first-level hearing.

For example, the rules will establish such details as how and when documents are to be provided by the claimant to the RPD and vice versa and the roles and responsibilities of IRB personnel supporting the adjudicative functions. They will also set out the factors that decision-makers will have to take into account when deciding whether to adjourn interviews or hearings at the RPD. Another set of rules will obviously have to be developed for the refugee appeal division.

The process for developing rules includes meaningful consultation with stakeholders and parties appearing before the IRB. In practice, we conduct both internal and external consultations before draft rules reach the stage of pre-publication in part I of the Canada Gazette for formal public comment. After that, the rules are submitted through the minister for cabinet approval and final publication in part II of the Canada Gazette. Once the new rules are in place, they will become the framework on which we will build the structure for the new divisions at the board.

Very important for us in this process is the ongoing relationship we have with our stakeholders, many of whose members have appeared before you in the last few weeks. We will be calling on our stakeholders and asking them to reach out to their membership to help us effectively structure our new processes.

In fact, we already have a meeting scheduled with our national stakeholders group, which includes the CCR, CBA, AQAADI, UNHCR, and others. I can assure you that Bill C-11 will be on the agenda.

There are a couple of points that were raised in committee last Thursday that I would like to briefly address.

Mr. Goodman stated publicly that we will provide a digital record of the interview to the claimant. At this point, it's too soon for us to indicate whether it will be a CD, a USB, a flashcard, or some other format.

The other point is that the IRB would have discretion to adjourn a proceeding for a vulnerable person or for operational or other valid reasons, such as fairness. In fact, one of the benefits we've identified for an early interview is the possibility of identifying vulnerable persons earlier in the process so that they can be appropriately accommodated.

In closing, I'd like to touch briefly on the minister's statement earlier this evening that amendments would be introduced that would see the PRAA function moved from CIC to the IRB. We believe that RPD decision-makers will be well placed to carry out this function, given their access to a world-renowned training program, legal support, and a high-calibre research capacity. But of course we await Parliament's direction in that regard.

As the minister has also indicated, letters have been exchanged between CIC and the IRB with regard to the suggested changes to the timelines for the information-gathering interview and the initial RPD hearing. Mr. Goodman indicated that we will give serious consideration to the proposal of 15 and 90 days, along with other proposals that may arise during our stakeholder consultations as part of the rule-writing process.

Finally, I'd like to quote Mr. Goodman's commitment, and this is what he said to you when he appeared last time:

The IRB will deliver, to the best of its ability, on the requirements of the legislation as determined by Parliament, and we will do so within the timeframes given and within the budget allotted, fulfilling our mandate to resolve cases efficiently, fairly, and in accordance with the law.

Thank you very much.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

What we proposed in the original Bill C-11 is what's called a bar on concurrent claims. Sometimes people come in on a manifestly false asylum claim and will double their chances: on advice of counsel, they'll file an asylum claim and will file a humanitarian and compassionate claim concurrently. What we've been saying in Bill C-11 is that you have to choose whether you're a refugee or whether you fall outside the definition of a refugee but still believe you have extenuating circumstances that should be considered by an immigration officer through an H and C application. So we said, you choose.

Now, some people have come to us and said, well, people might make the wrong choice. Somebody might end up in the asylum stream, even though the nature of their problem isn't really about persecution, doesn't really meet the statutory definition of a refugee, in which case we shouldn't penalize them but should allow them to move over to the stream in which their claim would be better considered. That would be before an independent, unfettered decision-maker in CIC, on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

I call it a bridging amendment. It allows people who get into the asylum queue to, before their hearing, move over to the humanitarian and compassionate queue. It allows more flexibility to make sure that people, once they have counsel, get into the right stream for their case.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I have read all of the witness statements as part of this review.

Let me begin by thanking all members of the committee for their diligent efforts over the past month. While not all members may agree on all details of the bill and the broader package of reforms, there is no doubt that all members have discharged their duties as legislators with evident concern for this very serious issue in all of its complexity.

And you are right to have done so because, at the end of the day, this reform is not about words on a piece of paper. It is about people. It is about justice, fairness and about redeeming Canada's refugee system from years of dysfunctionality, so that we might better protect those in need of our help, while discouraging those who would abuse our generosity.

Let's remember why we're here. For too many years governments of different stripes, including of my party, have looked the other way rather than address serious problems that have burdened—many would say have broken—our asylum system. With an average long-term backlog of 40,000 cases, we have a system that forces victims of torture to wait for more than a year and a half for the certainty of Canada's protection, while allowing manifestly false claimants to game our system and our taxpayers for years.

Mexican President Calderon reminded us of the consequences of our broken asylum system just last week, when he said,

I...know that there have been some who, abusing the generosity of the Canadian people, have perverted the noble aims of the asylum system to their own ends, which led the Canadian government to require visas for those travelling between our countries.

He went on to say, “We sincerely hope that the solution that this Parliament is studying through comprehensive amendments to the refugee law will also serve as a bridge that will allow us to renew our exchanges”.

Band-aid solutions have been tried in the past, Mr. Chairman, but they have failed, like injections of more taxpayers' money to fuel the broken status quo, but which left us no further ahead in dealing with a cumbersome system that is, quite frankly, too easily abused.

And so we must act. Bill C-11 represents an historic opportunity to do so. I do not pretend that the bill as presented by the government is perfect. But it is the result of years of study and consultation by my ministry, and experts, to design an asylum system that, in the words of former IRB Chair Peter Showler, is both “fast and fair.”

I believe that this bill strikes the right balance. But as I have said from the beginning of the process, the government is open to thoughtful improvements that achieve what I believe is our common goal: a fair and fast asylum system.

That this is the common goal came clearly to light in March of last year when the official opposition immigration critic, the member for Vaughan, demonstrated leadership by standing in the House of Commons and asking me, “Why has the Conservative government failed to provide a timely and efficient refugee determination system to people who desperately need one?”

His question, to be fair, reflected the policy of his party, which in its 2008 platform said, “A Liberal government will respect Canada's international commitments to refugees while providing a timelier and efficient refugee determination system”.

I replied to his question that I was delighted to hear the interest of the member in hopefully working together to create a more efficient refugee system. We have indeed, all of us, worked together to that end.

As members of the committee will know, I consulted with many of you prior to the introduction of Bill C-11, inviting ideas for sensible asylum reform. Following introduction of the bill, I went across the country to listen to stakeholders and others.

I'm very pleased to report that following that tour, virtually every newspaper editorial board in the country endorsed our reform package, as did dozens of stakeholders. But I took note of concerns expressed by some groups; for example, Christine Morrissey, the founder of the Rainbow Refugee Committee in Vancouver, and Heather Mantle of the Matthew House Refugee Centre in Windsor.

When Bill C-11 came before the House at second reading, I listened to every speech. I can assure you that I've read all the transcripts of this committee's hearings. During all of these debates and consultations, the government has taken note of constructive criticism and we recognize that we must work together with the opposition to craft a bill that will reflect a parliamentary consensus. But let me be clear, we cannot and will not do so at any expense.

As you proceed to clause-by-clause, we are open to sensible amendments that would render a fair and fast refugee determination process. However, if amendments are made to the bill that for example would significantly slow the process or would undermine our efforts to disincentivise waves of false claims from safe democratic countries, then the government will elect not to proceed with the bill and its associated reforms.

So the stakes are high. If members choose to play politics with this real opportunity for balanced reform, then let's be clear as to what we will all be losing. We will lose a new refugee appeal division for the vast majority of claimants, an appeal division that's better than what was contemplated in IRPA in 2002. That means that if the bill fails as a result of unreasonable amendments, no claimants from any country of origin will have access to a refugee appeal division. That will be a choice if people make such amendments.

Protection for bona fide refugees in a few weeks will be lost, rather than 19 months, which is the status quo. Removal of false claimants in about a year, rather than about five years, will be lost, as will some $1.8 billion in savings for taxpayers.

A program of assisted voluntary removal for failed claimants will be lost. Also, $540 million in new resources for the refugee system, including a 20% increase in resettled refugees and a 20% increase in the refugee assistance program for government-assisted refugees, would be lost. Finally, fully independent decision-makers--rather than political appointees--at the refugee protection division of the IRB would be lost.

Colleagues, I sincerely hope that we will not lose these progressive reforms. We can work together to put the interests of Canada, of taxpayers, of victims of persecution ahead of any of our own political interests. We will do so thanks in part, I believe, to the leadership of the official opposition. Their immigration critic has approached the government with determination and with a series of compelling and we believe workable amendments to the bill, as well as related regulations and IRB procedures. Allow me to detail these changes.

In response in particular to Mr. Bevilacqua's request to increase clarity, we propose to include the term “safe” in the legislation in relation to the designation of countries, and to provide greater transparency around the criteria that will have to be met to designate a safe country of origin.

We also propose to clearly limit the powers of the minister in the designation process. The accompanying regulations, which I am pleased to table today in draft form, further outline the criteria that will need to be met for a country to be designated as safe. You will note that these draft regulations further limit the minister's powers and require that a safe designation can only be made if an advisory panel, including at least two independent external human rights experts, recommends it. Of course, as we've said from the beginning, we anticipate the involvement in the UNHCR in that process.

These amendments go a long way toward depoliticizing the designation process.

A second amendment addresses concerns regarding access to the humanitarian and compassionate process. We've tabled an amendment that would allow people who withdraw their refugee claim prior to a hearing before the RPD to make an application for humanitarian and compassionate consideration. So that concurrent bar would be lifted at the front end of the process to allow people to redirect their claim into the appropriate stream.

A third legislative amendment we have proposed is to transfer the pre-removal risk assessment function from my ministry to the IRB. As the IRB presently delivers the majority of risk assessment decision-making, we agree with many experts that it is a more logical place in which to centralize the risk assessment function.

The official opposition immigration critic strongly advocated the views of many that the proposed timelines for the interview and initial hearing are too short. I do not share that concern. I believe, in fact, that the proposed timelines are longer than in all, or virtually all, of the comparable systems--for example, in western Europe--and those are benchmarks against which we must assess ourselves. But in order to get consensus on these reforms, I made the difficult decision to accept Mr. Bevilacqua's recommendations and to write to the IRB to suggest the timeframes for the triage interview or the information-gathering interview be moved from eight days to 15 days, and that the RPD hearing be moved from 60 days to 90 days. We've written to the IRB chairman recommending that and expressing our policy preference, and you will see in the letter tabled before you that he has written back positively.

I'll close now, Mr. Chairman.

Let me be clear, these changes together represent very significant changes to the bill, to procedures, and to regulations, and address most of the principal concerns that have been expressed by opposition members and interest groups. While I frankly have concerns that some of these measures may go too far in the other direction, not maintaining the kind of balance we hoped for, I know that the government must compromise in order to move the Balanced Refugee Reform Act forward, so we will compromise. For the greater good, we will accept these changes.

In closing, I would like to once again thank all of you for your hard work. And in particular, I would like to recognize the member for Vaughan, who has been a tenacious advocate for his party's tradition of fairness and justice, while demonstrating the kind of leadership that we need to make this minority Parliament work for all Canadians.

I look forward to your questions.

[Philip Mooney, Past President, Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, committee members, ladies and gentlemen. We have a submission that is on the way and I'll be reading excerpts from that submission.

CAPIC welcomes the opportunity to appear before this committee. We'd like to offer you some different perspectives and workable ideas. Our submission is based on recent interviews with refugee claimants, both current claimants and successful claimants. The existing refugee system is in need of fixing, and Bill C-11 contains both administrative and program fixes. It is to be praised for some new thinking.

We'd like to extend that new thinking. We will focus on three key elements. First, what factors influence an applicant's decision to make a refugee claim in Canada? Second, how can the new process be improved to better protect those who need sanctuary? Third, what elements must be retained to better program integrity?

First, many claimants learn about the refugee option from friends and relatives who are already here or from their communities outside their home country, most commonly in the United States. For example, there is a Creole radio station in Florida that refers individuals to an 800 number where they get such advice.

Second, many claimants come to the border after believing stories they hear from unscrupulous immigration facilitators. For example, we've included in our brief copies of ads run in Mexico by a ghost agent working out of Montreal, who offers to tell applicants exactly how to claim refugee status in Canada for $150, so they can then work here for several years.

Third, some refugees pay human traffickers for false documents and transportation assistance to avoid legal detection until they reach the Canadian border. We know of a consultant who sells maps to the Colombian community in the United States, showing them how best to avoid border inspections.

However, no matter how refugee claimants may choose to come to Canada, one thing is common to them all: rarely are intended claimants given a full and complete picture of the refugee process or other options to enter Canada legally. They are making risky, sometimes life-changing decisions based on incomplete, if not utterly false, information.

The government's initiative to offer failed claimants resettlement assistance abroad is a good one. This is an example of new thinking, but we believe it could also be improved. It's our members' experience that many who claim refugee status would not do so if they had a full explanation of what the process entails or if they found they could qualify to work and live in Canada under another immigration program.

To help refugee claimants make an informed choice, we recommend that they be given the opportunity to have all their options explained to them very early in the process. We believe the eight-day interview mechanism should be changed to thirty days to allow time for individuals, after entering at a port of entry or after indicating once in Canada that they want to file a claim, to consult an authorized third party who would help them understand other immigration options, including applying outside Canada in some other category, and fully understand the quality of their refugee claim.

When it comes to unscrupulous agents, this committee recommended changes two years ago to the regulations, which would have closed loopholes that permit said agents to operate. This committee also recommended that the body charged with regulating immigration consultants be wound down, reconstituted, and given more powers to prosecute those who would pervert the system, which would include the so-called bottom feeders who induce people to take enormous risks in travelling to Canada, often illegally, and in making false refugee claims. This committee repeated those recommendations last year.

We have heard that the government is moving at last to implement the recommendations of this committee, and we support that initiative wholeheartedly. This would help reduce the number of false claims. But we would like the committee to note that it is not a problem restricted to immigration consultants, regulated or unregulated. In fact, we believe that many more refugee cases are filed by lawyers than by consultants.

With regard to filing false claims, in some cases claimants cooperate willingly with unethical agents, paying for false documents and for preparation of claims that are without merit. The biggest deterrent to doing this would be a fast and efficient process that would return them to their home country before they had a chance to recoup their expenses. This then would send a message to that community that any money spent would be wasted, and they would move on to easier pickings.

For those who set out to break the law in Canada, mechanisms already exist to bring these individuals to justice. However, when it comes to immigration it's often unclear to the general public who they should call. Is it the RCMP, the local police, CBSA? What we need is a single hotline where individuals can anonymously report cases of immigration fraud or related criminal activity.

Many of our members report having received such calls from individuals who come from countries where the rule of law is compromised or even non-existent. It is heartening to see that they have already learned the value of participatory justice in Canada, but even more heartbreaking to see that little or nothing is done with their information.

With respect to the safe country of origin, designating certain countries as safe can reduce the number of false claims. However, our suggestion is that you incorporate into the concept that there are populations within any country, no matter how free or democratic, who are at risk of persecution. This list of populations at risk could be worked out with stakeholders and updated frequently.

[Elisabeth Garant, Director, Centre justice et foi]

We will basing ourselves on the brief that you received. We will be providing you with only the main excerpts from it.

Thank you for receiving us here, this evening. I would simply point out that the Centre justice et foi is a social analysis centre that is part of the Society of Jesus, better known as the Jesuit religious community. The centre's objective is to participate in building a society based on justice by promoting active citizenship for all, and particularly we encourage the establishment of a welcoming society for newcomers.

Since 1985, through the Vivre ensemble sector under the responsibility of Louise Dionne, we have been working on issues pertaining to immigration, refugee protection and the reception and integration of newcomers.

Before discussing the details of Bill C-11, which my colleague will be dealing with, I would simply like to point out some general aspects pertaining to the context of this bill. First of all, over the past few decades, we have seen awareness and respect for rights and democracy gain significant ground, making it increasingly more intolerable to accept situations in the world where these conditions do not exist.

Hence we have seen the types of persecution defined by the Geneva Convention applying to more and more individuals, groups and regions throughout the world and an increasing number of individuals are forced to apply for asylum. This situation will not change in the years to come. Regardless of how we try to restrict, monitor or turn away people requiring protection, they will find other ways of coming. It is absolutely essential that we have a bill, a reform, an immigration act, and in particular, refugee protection, that are able to meet our challenges.

I would like to point out that this trend that we see in the bill is a repetition of many aspects and realities that we see in other North American and European countries, at least in the northern hemisphere. Well ahead of us, these countries implemented certain measures such as their visa policies, accelerated asylum review procedures, sanctions against carriers and other measures.

Now that these measures have been introduced, particularly the measure pertaining to the accelerated asylum application review procedure, which this bill deals with specifically, it seems to me that we have to look at the experience in other countries. We are already able to see that the measures covered by the bill are not effective, that illegal migration is increasing and has not been decreased by such measures. We have especially noticed that these measures have been particularly negative for human rights. The fact that Canada has based itself on these models, which have not proven to be effective, is extremely worrisome and questionable.

In the few minutes remaining, I would like to allow my colleague to present the more specific aspects of the bill.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Good evening. This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting number 21, Monday, May 31, 2010. This is a three-hour session.

Pursuant to the order of reference of Thursday, April 29, 2010, we are considering Bill C-11, an act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

I'm sorry for the delay, ladies and gentlemen.

We have three groups of witnesses. The first group is the Centre justice et foi, Elisabeth Garant and Louise Dionne. Welcome, ladies, to the committee. Thank you for coming.

We have the Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants, Philip Mooney, the past president, and Timothy Morson, director of policy and certified Canadian immigration consultant.

By teleconference from Washington, we have a lawyer by the name of Howard Anglin. Mr. Anglin, this isn't televised; it's via telephone. As you can hear, we're having technical difficulties and we hope we can pull this off with you.

[Dogan Dogan]

I will start and if Mr. Pinarbasi would like to continue, he will take the next step.

Honourable members of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, my name is Dogan Dogan. I am a Canadian citizen of Kurdish descent, a resident of Toronto, Ontario. I am currently working at the Kurdish Community and Information Centre, advising the president and the board of directors on issues concerning Kurds and their community. I hold a Masters of Science degree in International Economics and Finance from Brandeis University in Waltham, U.S.A., and an MBA degree from Suffolk University in Boston.

On behalf of the Toronto Kurdish Community and Information Centre, I am here with Mr. Huseyin Pinarbasi to speak about the Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

Canada is a member of the G-8. Its per capita GDP, living standards, health care system, educational system, not to mention—

[Sharalyn Jordan, Rainbow Refugee Committee]

Thank you.

On behalf of the Rainbow Refugee Committee in Vancouver, I want to thank you for the opportunity to present our position on Bill C-11.

Canada's refugee protection system is held up as a model for others, not because it's perfect, but because it comes closer than most to upholding our international commitments to protect the lives and safety of those who face persecution. This core purpose must be front and centre in any reform efforts.

Canada has been a global leader in refugee protection for those at risk of persecution due to sexual orientation and gender identity. We were one of the first countries to recognize that homophobia and transphobia can result in persecution; 21 countries now do the same. This protection is vital in a world where lesbian, gay, bi, trans, and queer people continue to be persecuted in at least 80 countries globally.

Rainbow Refugee supports efforts to create a faster system, reducing the time claimants spend in uncertainty. We see efficiency, fairness, and effectiveness as complementary goals. However, we are deeply concerned that Bill C-11 undermines fairness and that lesbian, gay, bi, and trans refugee claimants in particular will be disadvantaged. These concerns are based on a decade of experience focused on this work and are shared by other LGBT refugee support groups—SOY Express in Toronto and AGIR in Montreal.

Our members have left countries where they have been under surveillance, arrested, imprisoned, extorted, and, for some, tortured because of their sexuality or gender identity. Survival has required keeping silent, being vigilant, and remaining hidden. The silencing impacts of persecution and trauma do not disappear on arrival. I know one man who spent 27 days in detention before working up the nerve to tell his duty counsel that he was gay. What kind of interview would he give at eight days? The expedited timeframe proposed in the background to Bill C-11 will not give LGBT claimants a fair chance to prepare themselves or their documents. Hearings held with poor evidence will result in poor decisions and more appeals—not fair, effective, or efficient.

We welcome the long-awaited implementation of the refugee appeal division. The right to a full merits-based review is fundamental to fairness. This appeal should consider all relevant evidence, not only new or previously unavailable evidence. This is important to us because country condition evidence for LGBT claims is very hard to find. Our members bring all the evidence they can to their hearings.

I know a gay man who lost his PRRA because it only looks at new evidence. Canada was willing to deport this man to a country that criminalizes gays and lesbians because he had no new evidence to prove he would be targeted.

Humanitarian and compassionate applications are an absolutely critical safety net for lesbian, gay, bi, and trans people who are at risk of serious harm in their home countries. Determining when homophobia and transphobia cross the threshold and become persecution is challenging. Board members struggle to make this call. Good information is sparse, and the gap between laws on paper and on-the-ground conditions is large.

Consider the experience of one of our members and where the harms against her crossed into persecution. Angela is from a West African country. She was beaten by her father when he learned she was a lesbian. Her church expelled her. Rumours spread. Townspeople began throwing rocks at her window. It became impossible for her to go outside without being harassed. She narrowly escaped from a gang of young men threatening to rape her and she has a knife wound from the attack.

She was not granted protection under sections 96 or 97. The board member found her credible, but determined that state protection would be available because laws in her country only criminalize male homosexuality. Angela has been in Canada for over two years. She works in an office and has begun a relationship with a woman she's met at work. She has found a church that has embraced her. But provisions in Bill C-11 would leave Angela without the option of an H and C application.

If we are going to define the limits of refugee protection this stringently, then we must allow for the safety net of a humanitarian and compassionate appeal. I urge you to eliminate the ban on H and C applications for claimants and to omit the unworkable restriction on considering risk in an H and C application.

We also strongly oppose giving the minister power to create a designated country list that denies access to appeal based on nationality. The list violates principles of equality before the law, has the potential to politicize protection, and leaves life or death decisions in the hands of one person. The designated safe country list is profoundly unsafe for lesbian, gay, bi, and trans refugee claimants. It would be perilously easy to designate a country as safe based on inaccurate or insufficient information about the on-the-ground realities.

A safe country list cannot accommodate the complexity and flux that currently exists in persecution and protection for lesbian, gay, bi, or trans people. Could Brazil be on this list? It hosts the largest gay pride parade in the world, with over three million people celebrating, but it also has the highest rate of homophobic murders in the world. Would it be on the safe list because these murders are reported, or would it be on the unsafe list because the murders happen in the first place and the police seem unable to curb them? South Africa recognizes same sex marriage and yet human rights organizations there report 10 cases a week in which lesbians are targeted for corrective rape and the police fail to investigate. We've heard Bogota described by one man as a great place to be gay. Another gay man described it as a terrifying city, after spending 10 years on the run trying to escape death threats. Within the same country of origin, people's vulnerability and the viability of state protection vary considerably, based on a person's social class, race, gender, religion, and social networks. It is precisely when country conditions appear safe on paper that refugee decisions on people who are lesbian, gay, bi, or trans are most complex and the safety net of an appeal is most needed.

[Sylvain Thibault, Coordinator, Projet Refuge Program, Montreal City Mission]

I am pleased to be making our presentation alongside a representative from Romero House, one of our partners in Toronto.

Mr. Chair, honourable members of the committee, ladies and gentlemen, we are here today representing the Montreal City Mission, which is now celebrating its 100^th year of assisting refugees from all walks of life.

We want to thank you for the opportunity to share with you our opinion on Bill C-11 today. I head the Project Refuge program, a specialized residence for men and unaccompanied minors in need of international protection.

Our mandate is to provide specialized psychosocial services to the most vulnerable asylum seekers. So I see first-hand the immense vulnerability of individuals who have lost all their points of reference after suffering repeated persecution.

The clients we serve often bear deep psychological scars. And those painful scars influence their thoughts and actions, as well as their ability to recollect the events tied to their persecution.

When clients come to us, workers put mechanisms in place to help foster strength and resilience. Those mechanisms will allow the person to recount their situation in a climate of trust, without being afraid of further traumatization. Given our first-hand experience with these clients, we are especially concerned about certain aspects of Bill C-11, more specifically, the information-gathering interview within eight days of the asylum claim being received, an interview which is conducted by an IRB official.

We are very concerned about the ability of our residents to attend the interview under the best psychological and physical conditions possible. You and I both know that any statement made at any level in a refugee claim case can have a dramatic impact. In some cases, someone could be sent back to their country of origin to endure further persecution, torture or even death, if their claim is denied.

It is our belief that vulnerable individuals need more time to regain their strength so as to be able to more clearly articulate what they endured in their home country. For many of them, the persecution has to do with a particular aspect of themselves or even an alleged aspect. That kind of persecution leaves a permanent psychological mark, as you would no doubt agree.

The first few days after arrival are very hard for most individuals. We even see people who are incapable of giving coherent answers to the simplest questions. The goal of organized violence is to put people in a constant state of fear and to destroy their trust in others. And that inevitably leads to a fear of authority figures. Many of them experience mood swings and intense fits of anger as a direct result of the violence they endured. Some even have suicidal thoughts in the first few days or weeks.

Cut off from their social and spiritual networks, and finding themselves in a climate of hostility, where they are forced to recount what they have experienced, some of these individuals will ease their pain by going into denial and disassociating themselves from reality. They are referred for medical care and receive medication, as well as all the side effects that go along with that.

I am here with Kemoko, who agreed to represent our residents. In the past 20 years, more than a thousand people have come through our doors. I asked him if he would have been ready for an information-gathering interview with an immigration official eight days after arriving. I will let Kemoko answer that.

[Mary Jo Leddy, Member of the Ontario Sanctuary Coalition, Founder of the Romero House for Refugees, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Merci beaucoup.

My name is Mary Jo Leddy and I have lived and worked with refugees for more than 20 years at a place called Romero House, which is a welcome centre for refugees. I also teach theology at the University of Toronto and am a member of the Order of Canada.

I have attended hundreds of refugee hearings and hundreds and hundreds of interviews with immigration officers. I believe that at Romero House we now have a collective wisdom about the immigration system, about its problems and about how it could and should work. It's an accumulated wisdom, and we don't have time to deal with all of it at this time.

During these 20 years I've also been an active member of the Ontario Sanctuary Coalition, which is a member of the national sanctuary movement, with members of churches all over the country. Over the years, various churches have offered sanctuary to refugees who were in danger of being deported back to places where their lives would be at risk.

Given the limits of this presentation, I would like to focus simply on three points, and I will be brief. The first is that Bill C-11, as proposed, will provoke a massive increase in sanctuary cases in churches.

Second, having a faster decision-making process and a fairer one is imperative.

Third, we'd like to speak about the unforeseen consequences of the designated country list.

First, on sanctuary, we predict that because of all the reasons we have stated in the sanctuary report, Bill C-11, unless it is amended, will result in a massive increase in requests for sanctuary. Not all of these requests will be granted, but some will--many more than is the case now. Our experience is that very ordinary groups, when faced with a real person whose life is in danger, will offer sanctuary.

I'm here to say, make no mistake, unless this bill is amended, the incidents of sanctuary in churches will increase. And I'm here to say, for the sanctuary movement, we would much prefer that this bill be amended.

On the second point, faster and fairer, it often seems that this is only a concern of the government, but it is the concern of every refugee to have a faster determination process and a fairer one. On a daily basis, they know the cost of the slow and cumbersome and unworkable process we have now.

I want to invite Gift Ogi, who's a member of Romero House, to say this in her own words.

[Dr. Shahid Hashmi]

We would definitely support efficiency and qualification, if Bill C-11 will stop inefficiency.

The second recommendation is that you cannot deal with time by days. It has to be case by case.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

You are from Toronto. There are lots of members of Parliament from Toronto who are Liberals. Perhaps you can persuade some of them that this is not a good direction to go and that having a safe country destination is not the right direction, because next Tuesday we are going to start doing clause-by-clause recommendations. By Thursday night we'll be finished, and the week after that we'll be back in front of the House of Commons with Bill C-11.

Have you any comments on this part of the bill?

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

As you may know, both the New Democrats and the Bloc are very much against the destination of safe countries. Can you imagine the trauma of that young woman from Congo, if she comes from a “safe” country? Perhaps Mexico could be declared a safe country. Any number of countries could be so declared. Ghana is on a safe country list in England. After what she experienced, she may have been so traumatized that she messed up her hearings.

In this case, with this Bill C-11, a safe country means that she will not have a chance to make an appeal. That would be grossly unfair, to my mind.

Have you talked to some of your members of Parliament in Vancouver? I believe that is where you are from.

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

There are many things in the bill. There is an appeal process in place. Like you, we believe that we should accelerate some of the process. It can cause social problems, collateral damage. I hear you well when you speak about efficiencies. But what do you think of the principles in Bill C-11? What about the appeal process, the time allotted to prepare a case? Can I have your point of view on that?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

It's the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting number 20, Thursday, May 27, 2010, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Orders of the day are pursuant to the order of reference of Thursday, April 29, 2010, Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

We have with us our witnesses today, our guests from the CanPak Chamber of Commerce. Shahid Hashmi is the chairman—good evening to you, sir—and Sohabe Hashmi is the administrative director—good evening to you, sir.

Thank you very much for coming to the committee via Toronto. We're going to give you up to 10 minutes to make a presentation to us. Then some of the committee members will have some questions for you. You can start right now. Thank you again.

[Andrew Telegdi, Former Parliamentary Secretary, Former Chair and Vice-Chair of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, As an Individual]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'm very pleased to be here.

Let me say that some things don't change. I used to have all sorts of problems with the parliamentary secretary when I chaired the committee, but we worked it out.

First and foremost, I think it's important for committee members to know that I'm a refugee from the class of '57 following the Hungarian revolution and was one of approximately 40,000 people who got asylum in Canada after the uprising. So this is an issue that is close to my heart.

When I dealt with issues related to immigration and citizenship, I always operated in a pretty non-partisan fashion. I disagreed with my government at one point and I resigned as parliamentary secretary. I served as an associate member of the committee for a number of years because I would not be put back on as a member. Then, when the situation changed, I got elected as chair and, subsequently, vice-chair.

It is an issue that I'm very much interested in. As I said, when I was chair of the committee, I challenged the committee members to operate in a non-partisan fashion and I defended the committee decisions to government and advocated for them.

Looking at the changes, I'm really glad that Mr. Girard is here because he talks about coming back 25 years after he helped draft the original IRB system and about identifying many problems.

Mr. Chair and members of committee, I hope you are not going to be coming back after 25 years have gone by and having somebody else come back and say that the problems haven't been solved.

One of the things that concerns me most about Bill C-11 is the proposed timeline. I hear you talking about going to clause-by-clause and that causes me a great deal of concern, because I think issues such as Bill C-11 and its implications should be very transparent, and input should be sought. I can't understand why you as a committee would not want to take your time to make sure you get it right, because we don't want to have Mr. Girard's experience repeated.

In terms of the bill itself, I just want to give you one example of a case I dealt with when I was parliamentary secretary. It was the case of a young woman from the former state of Yugoslavia who felt that her refugee claim was turned down because the board member of the IRB did not believe there was collusion among the government, the media, and the police in the former state of Yugoslavia.

She was set for deportation and was going to be sent out of the country—this was back in 2000—on a Monday afternoon. She was going to arrive in Belgrade at 10 the next morning and NATO was scheduled to start bombing at noon. How ridiculous a situation can you have? Certainly, incompetence of board members existed at the time, and changes have been made to ensure greater competence.

Another issue I'm very cognizant of is the fact that we fought to get the board appointment process right. Back in 2006, we had a backlog of 20,000 claimants, and now the backlog is over 60,000 claimants. What happened was that the vacancies on the board were not filled up in a timely fashion, which resulted in growth in the backlog. In a lot of ways, we had solved much of the problem by getting the backlog down to 20,000, and it was going to go down further.

Also, the changes to the system mandated that we have a refugee appeal division, and that was not put in place. But it was on the verge of being put in place once the backlog got down to 20,000.

My recommendation to those of you on the committee--and I make this as an individual and I make it in a very non-partisan fashion--is to take the time to get this right. Make sure that the stakeholders and Canadians have a genuine opportunity to have input into this legislation, because I think it's legislation that Canada, in its past history, can be very proud of.

We want to make sure of that going forward. The fine aims of the legislation, such as speeding up the system, are laudable, because the quicker we can bring certainty to an individual, the better off we all are, including the individual.

[James Kafieh]

The Canadian Arab Federation is the national organization serving Arab Canadians. Since 1967, we've advocated on a wide range of topics. However, our 500,000 Arab Canadians have a special interest in Bill C-11.

We come from a part of the world that is generating a lot of refugees and we have a special interest in this legislation. There are six areas that I want to touch on with regard to the specific concerns we have about Bill C-11.

We would point out that not all aspects of the proposed changes are negative. For example, the Canadian Arab Federation applauds the inclusion of provisions for appeals on the basis of merit and also more timely hearings for refugees.

However, there are also very disturbing changes embedded in the legislation. As the lives of refugees are at stake, these aspects require special attention today.

Of the six points to touch on, the first is with regard to the interview at the Immigration and Refugee Board. A fair and expeditious process for assessing the refugee claimants is a common goal; however, “fair” and “expeditious” are not alternative choices.

The requirement for refugee claimants to give details of their claim at an information gathering interview within eight days of a claim being referred to the Immigration and Refugee Board is insufficient and prejudicial to legitimate claimants.

Refugees undergo traumatic and gruelling processes to arrive in Canada. They will understandably require more time than is contemplated in the legislation just to recover from their odyssey. In addition, they legitimately need to consult legal counsel prior to presenting their narrative. Legal aid certificates often require longer than the eight-day period allotted just to be issued.

The initial interview requirement undermines due process, so we say that the initial interview should be deleted from the legislation.

The second point is with regard to the hearing date scheduling. The present scheduling of hearings is profoundly problematic. Refugee claimants should not have to wait years to have their claim adjudicated; however, many refugees will necessarily require more than the 60 days allotted under the legislated to prepare their case.

Evidence of persecution may be difficult to obtain from dysfunctional parts of the world. States that generate larger numbers of refugees are often the very states that are most oppressive and chaotic. In addition, even evidence gathered in Canada, such as medical or psychological assessments and reports, may take much longer to be produced than the 60 days being contemplated in the legislation.

The right to an expeditious hearing should be clearly stated in the legislation. However, hearings should generally be scheduled on the basis of when they are ready to proceed, with long-term time limits setting out maximum time limits.

The third item is with regard to the first instance decision-makers. The move away from an Immigration and Refugee Board that is uploaded with political appointees is a welcome measure; however, limiting the decision-makers of first instance to civil servants will undermine the objectivity of the refugee process. A process that handles appointments to the Immigration and Refugee Board without political interference or partisan consideration would be a welcome measure. Decision-makers should be appointed for fixed terms and qualified candidates, both from inside and from outside the civil service, should be considered for this role.

Number four is with regard to designated countries of origin. Provisions under the legislation that would enable the minister to designate countries of origin would unnecessarily politicize and undermine the integrity of the refugee determination process. Such determinations also violate international law by discriminating on the basis of country of origin.

[Alexandra Pierre, Community Organizer, Responsible for anti-racism and discrimination issues, Fédération des femmes du Québec]

Good afternoon. Thank you for receiving us and allowing us to make this presentation.

The Fédération des femmes du Québec, la Coalition des familles homoparentales, the Concertation des luttes contre l'exploitation sexuelle, or CLES, the Regroupement québécois des Centres d'aide et de lutte contre les agressions à caractère sexuel, or RQCALACS, and the Table des groupes de femmes de Montréal all work to promote and defend women's interests and for the recognition of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, LGBT people.

We support the objective of a faster refugee determination system, to the extent that speed does not jeopardize refugees' fundamental rights, and we welcome the introduction of an appeal division under Bill C-11. Despite this progress, we wish to express our serious concern about the rest of the bill.

As a result of the proposed amendments, certain asylum applicants will not have access to the appeal division as a result of their nationality and origin. The introduction of the term “designated country” or “safe country” violates the fundamental principles of the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which clearly establish the right to equality.

Domestic abuse, crimes of honour, genital mutilation, rape and commercial sexual exploitation are all forms of violence or persecution suffered almost exclusively by women. The women from countries that might be characterized as safe are not protected from these violations of their rights. In some countries, discrimination and mistreatment are open, even legal, whereas in others, they are more concealed.

I'm going to tell you about the case of a woman whom the signatory groups to this brief have supported. That woman from Honduras was detained in an apartment by a criminal gang that accused her friend of being a police informer. In that woman's presence, the friend in question was mutilated and then decapitated. The woman was subsequently raped by the members of the criminal gang. She then had to leave her husband behind and seek asylum in Canada. She said that, since the police was corrupt, she could not inform on those police officers because otherwise she would be dead.

At her IRB hearing, the panel found that, based on the national documentation binder, Honduras was a country that cracked down on criminal gangs and enforced laws against such crimes. In spite of everything, however, the government of Honduras is still incapable of eradicating this type of sexual violence, which is quite common.

[Raphael Girard]

There is no protection issue for citizens in the EU. They have the right of mobility among 27 developed countries and they have individual protections by the European Court of Human Rights.

So what do I recommend for Bill C-11?

First of all, we need to be more courageous in limiting access, starting with citizens of the EU.

Second, we need to make the interpretation of the convention used by the public servants who preside at a hearing of first instance more constructive and closer to that used by other countries.

Third, we need to enhance our efforts to sign safe third country agreements with other countries through which our refugee claim load currently passes. Otherwise, we'll continue this schizophrenic policy we now have, where we have the most open system in the world, but we also have a very active cadre of people in foreign airports interdicting passengers so they can't come here and use it.

[Raphael Girard, As an Individual]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'll try to get through this in as short a time as possible, but I warn you that my presentation is meaty and full of precise technical terms. I've given a copy of my text to the clerk so that the interpreters can follow.

Mr. Chairman and ladies and gentlemen, 25 years ago, I led the task force that produced the existing refugee determination system for Canada. It was the first time we embedded the right to claim refugee status in Canadian law.

I can also say I don't envy the people who are going through the reform. What strikes me most about the debate surrounding Bill C-11is how little the objectives and the problems have changed, despite more than 20 years of experience with the phenomenon of refugee claims in Canada.

Looking back to 1985, the Singh decision forced the department to change the ad hoc processes it had for dealing with refugee appeals against removal. The backlog created at that time was decades long. Reform was essential.

Flora MacDonald mandated me to form a task force, and I must say that the objectives we had then and the objectives for Bill C-11 today are virtually identical. Everyone wants a rapid and fair decision-making process, early recognition of valid claims, and prompt removal of failed claimants to discourage frivolous claims by those who would exploit the determination system for other purposes.

Despite our best efforts, the system we delivered in 1989 failed. It was dysfunctional from day one. There was a conflict between the design and the law.

The design concept was based on the premise, a very important premise, that an independent tribunal should be available to those, and only those, whom Canada would have an obligation to protect if they met the definition of “convention refugee”. We rejected the idea that Canada had an obligation to facilitate claims by those seeking to come to Canada from other signatory countries such as the United States, Germany, and other western European countries whose performance in protecting refugees showed them to be in good standing.

Although provisions to achieve this were present in the bill that became law in 1989, the essential restraints on access to the independent tribunal were not enacted by the government, and the system was therefore left vulnerable to overload, despite the enormous budget of $100 million that was made available to the IRB in its first year. To compound this issue, the IRB adopted an interpretation of the convention that was and remains broader than that used in any other signatory country, leading to an acceptance rate of claims that approached and sometimes exceeded 50%, which in those days was easily double that of the next most generous country.

Since then, the system has been chronically backlogged. As a result, there have been episodes of wholesale abuse by bogus claimants.

Bill C-11 has some interesting features to expedite the process and limit appeals, but it fails to come to grips with the underlying problems that plague the existing system. The bill replaces order in council nominees with public servants at the hearing of first instance, which will make the appointment process simpler; however, the hearing format with counsel remains the same.

An additional element has been tacked on at the front end, which you talked about earlier, and the de novo is available at the back end on appeal from a refusal at the hearing of first instance, which can include a second oral hearing in some cases where credibility is an issue.

These three steps replace the single encounter the claimant now has in the current system. The Bill C-11 reforms risk making the overall process more complex, not less.

It's difficult to believe that a more complex system can be faster despite the time guillotines that are intended to be imposed. I don't know of any tribunal that isn't backlogged and that values timeliness over integrity of process.

Currently, appeals against sponsored immigrant refusals made to the IRB take up to two years to be heard. Spousal cases in this group command the highest priority in the immigration firmament. And applicants don't seek delay. They want to come to Canada and be reunited with their families.

If two years is the best the IRB can do for high-priority people who don't seek delay, is it really realistic to think that the IRB can do better with a bigger and more complex challenge with regard to people for whom delay can be a positive feature that they in fact often seek?

The underlying problem with Bill C-11 is that everyone will have a right to a hearing before an independent decision-maker. This is neither necessary nor practical. Where there is no protection issue, there should be no involvement by the IRB.

Neither the charter nor the 1951 UN convention obliges us to hear claims of refugee status. The convention only obliges member states to refrain from refoulement, which is the forceable return of refugees to a country where they face persecution. Removing people from Canada without a hearing of a claim to refugee status does not contravene the convention nor the charter if it is done in a way that does not expose them to refoulement.

For example, Bill C-11 will allow the continuation of the absurdity of the current Canadian system, which has been abused wholesale by claimants from the Czech Republic and Hungary.

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I have always believed and thought, having applied it personally, that the way to manage or prevent a flood of false refugees—let's call them that—was to enforce a visa policy. We did it with Costa Rica, in particular, when we were in power, and it worked.

Putting forward a policy that asserts that such and such a country is a safe country strips Canada, in its scheme of values and its most firmly established program, of all its power to say that each case is specific. That means, for example, that Mexico could be perceived as a safe country, whereas, at the time, more than 1,000 refugees from Mexico were accepted. That's only one example among many others.

Instead of starting to consider refugees or future refugees as people who may abuse the system by suggesting that they are from such and such a country, why not do what we did with the United States, and sign a bilateral agreement with exemption measures, like the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement? That would be better than starting to prepare a list of all safe countries, whether it be Greece or other countries. Ultimately, such a list will give refugees certain impressions. There may be abuses because, in order to take the pressure off his shoulders, the minister will be free to respond as he did during the Olympic Games. To one refugee claimant from Japan, he answered that Japan was a safe country and that that made no sense. We don't know what is going on in one country or another. There may be problems for reasons of sexual orientation, religion, gender or other matters.

So why put two fundamental elements in this act? I think we have to retain humanitarian and compassionate grounds—we can discuss that later, when my colleagues talk about it. However, why add this matter of designated safe countries, when all we wanted was to establish a much fairer process, similar, for example, to the provisions on the Refugee Appeal Division that we agreed on in Bill C-11? I'm entirely in favour of that. We didn't need to say that we're going to establish a list of safe countries and subsequently send somewhat contradictory messages.

Saying that you'll have a panel means you're in favour of the principle.

[Peter MacDougall, Director General, Refugees, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

Thank you very much. We're all very pleased to be here to address you on Bill C-11, the government's balanced refugee reform legislation.

As you know, Bill C-11 proposes to reform our asylum system by giving faster protection to asylum claimants who truly need it, reducing the abuse of our system, and providing for faster removal of failed claimants.

We are aware of four areas of concern for the committee: the safe country of origin list; matters concerning humanitarian and compassionate claims; timelines for initial interviews with claimants and later hearings before the board; the hiring and independence of the officials who carry out interviews and hearings at the board.

Today, we will address the first two matters. I understand the committee will later be hearing from representatives of the board, who will address the latter two concerns.

As you know, Mr. Chair, as part of the proposed reform measures, the government would develop a safe country of origin list. Most Canadians and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees recognize that there are places in the world where the persecution of people is less likely to occur compared to other areas.

In his testimony to the committee earlier this week, Mr. Abraham Abraham, the UNHCR representative in Canada, noted that the UNHCR does not oppose the introduction of the safe country of origin list, as long as it is not used as an absolute bar to the consideration of an asylum claim. A safe country of origin list is a necessary tool to reform the asylum system. We have no way within the current system to rapidly address surges of asylum claims that could prove to be unfounded, such as claims from individuals whose countries have strong democratic, judicial, and accountability frameworks to protect their citizens. Without such a tool to help manage claims, our only other recourse is to impose visas.

Mr. Chair, we are aware that the proposal concerning this safe country of origin list has prompted concerns. As you know, the minister has stressed his desire to be flexible on this matter, and his appearance here on May 4 indicated his willingness to work out amendments either to the bill or to regulations that would clearly delineate the process for designating safe countries and the associated criteria.

As you know, Mr. Chair, the list of safe countries would include those that do not normally produce refugees, have robust human rights records, and offer state protection to their citizens. The safe country of origin list, however, would not be exhaustive, including countries from A to Z.

I would like to note that in developing the proposed list, we would not close the door on refugees seeking Canada's protection.

All eligible asylum claimants, regardless of where they came from, would continue to receive a fair hearing before the board just as they do today.

I would also like to underline that under this proposal, asylum claimants from safe countries of origin would receive the same hearing and access they receive under the system today.

In order to be even considered for the list, countries would first need to meet quantitative criteria. For example, only if the volume of asylum claims from a country exceeded a specified threshold and the acceptance rate for these claims did not reach a specific threshold, would that country be considered for the list.

These thresholds will be articulated in revised regulations, a draft of which will be provided to the committee, as agreed to by the minister.

Countries meeting the threshold would then undergo a thorough assessment, based on objective criteria. Such assessments would consider whether the country had a strong record of providing its citizens with human rights protections, and the availability of state protection and redress. The goal of these is to clearly delineate the criteria for the designation of safe countries of origin, including the factors that would trigger a review of a particular country, and ensure that the minister would not have discretion to designate a country that had not undergone a rigorous assessment.

This assessment would be done by a panel of experts from a variety of departments. It would make recommendations to the minister about which countries to include on the list once the country assessments were completed. We would also seek the input of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in this process.

Using a safe country of origin mechanism to deter and manage spikes in asylum claims is not unique to Canada. Our approach would be consistent with similar policies in many European countries, including the United Kingdom, France, and Germany.

In addition, most European Union states also have accelerated asylum procedures for the nationals of other EU member states, which are considered to be generally safe.

Furthermore, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has noted that the principle of developing such a list is not inconsistent with acceptable asylum practices.

I should note that Canada already makes determinations on country conditions, such as when ministers receive advice on which countries should be placed on the temporary stay of removal list.

This is also the case with visa policy decisions. Countries are treated differently. Some countries have a visa exemption and some countries do not.

Developing a safe country of origin list would fundamentally help reduce abuse of Canada's asylum system by those who are not truly in need of our protection.

Mr. Chair, we also realize that the proposed provisions on the humanitarian and compassionate program are prompting some concern. It is worth noting that the original intent of the H and C provision was to provide the government with the flexibility to approve exceptional and compelling cases not anticipated in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. It was never intended to be an alternate immigration stream or an appeal mechanism for failed asylum claimants. It should be reserved for exceptional cases.

But what has happened is that some failed asylum claimants use the humanitarian and compassionate provision in another process to try to remain in Canada. In fact, more than half of the humanitarian and compassionate backlog is now made up of failed asylum claimants.

The government has therefore proposed a one-year bar on humanitarian and compassionate claims following the last IRB decision, in order to discourage failed claimants from seeking to remain in Canada.

The idea here is to recognize that, since failed claimants would have just had their risk assessed, most would have access to an appeal and all could seek leave from the Federal Court.

In addition, these H and C applications often raise issues related to personal risk and country conditions, factors that are already considered by the IRB when it assesses the asylum claim. As a result, the proposed reforms also include removing the consideration of certain kinds of risks from humanitarian and compassionate applications.

Specifically, this concerns risks as defined under sections 96 and 97 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which are also assessed as part of the refugee protection process and in a pre-removal risk assessment. This reform would clarify the distinction between H and C decision-making and the refugee protection and pre-removal risk assessment processes.

Under the proposed measures, H and C decisions would focus on considerations such as establishment in Canada, the best interests of the child, relationships in Canada, the country of origin's ability to provide medical treatment, and risks of discrimination in that country, as well as generalized risk in the country of origin.

In conclusion, as the minister has said, the proposed measures meet and exceed Canada's domestic and international obligations and maintain the balance and fairness that are the principles of our entire immigration, refugee, and citizenship systems.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Good afternoon, everyone. This is meeting number 19 of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, on Thursday, May 27, 2010. The orders of the day are pursuant to the order of reference of Thursday, April 29, 2010, Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

For the first hour today, we have officials from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration. We have Peter MacDougall, who is the director general of refugees. In fact, I think I recognize all these names; I think everybody has been here before. We have Jennifer Irish, director of asylum policy program development; John Butt, manager of program development; and Luke Morton, who is senior legal counsel and manager of the refugee legal team, legal services. You all have very long titles, but that's good.

Mr. MacDougall, I've spoken to you earlier. I'd like to welcome you and your colleagues to the committee. I think you're going to make a brief presentation of up to 10 minutes. Then my colleagues may have some questions for you.

I'd like to welcome all of you to the committee.

Citizenship Act

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to address Bill C-467, brought forward by the hon. member for Vancouver South.

This private member's bill stems from the passage, in the 39th Parliament, of Bill C-37, An Act to amend the Citizenship Act. Bill C-467 calls on the government to treat children born to or adopted overseas by Crown servants, including Canadian Forces personnel and federal and provincial public servants, as children born in Canada such that they would be able to pass citizenship on to any children they may have or adopt outside Canada.

First of all, I would like to commend the member for Vancouver South for his commitment to this issue, and I would like all hon. members to know that the government supports the intention of Bill C-467. However, we have some technical concerns with the bill in its current form, as it does not achieve its intended objective and would have, as the member points out, some unintended consequences.

Nevertheless, I am confident that we can address these concerns together, with the co-operation of our parliamentary colleagues. The bill will have a positive impact on the children of Crown servants and our military serving abroad.

I would like to share with my hon. colleagues a very brief overview of Bill C-37 and the reasons that led us, as a government, to restore citizenship to lost Canadians and to include a clear limit on citizenship by descent.

Members of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration will recall many witnesses who testified three years ago this spring as they shared their love for this country as proud citizens. They shared their dismay and their frustration when they described how it felt to discover that their citizenship was not, in fact, recognized by the law.

The public outcry was enormous, and that is why the government corrected the legislation. When Bill C-37 came into effect a year ago, it restored or gave citizenship to most people who were known as lost Canadians. Changes to the law restored or granted citizenship to the vast majority of those who lost or did not have it due to outdated provisions in previous legislation.

The changes meant that people who became citizens when the first Citizenship Act came into force in 1947, and people born or naturalized in Canada after 1947 and subsequently lost their citizenship, would reacquire their citizenship unless they formally renounced it or had it revoked because of fraud. Foreign-born persons adopted by Canadians between January 1, 1947 and February 15, 1977 would also be eligible to apply for citizenship. Complex rules that required some citizens by descent to take steps to apply to keep their citizenship were simply eliminated.

The new law also set a limit on citizenship by descent to the first generation born abroad. That was done to uphold the value of Canadian citizenship by requiring a real and concrete connection to Canada.

Hon. members will also recall debate of Bill C-14 in 2007 and the steps Canadians adopting foreign-born children had to take before their children could become Canadian citizens.

International adoption is a complex process, as we all know, involving many layers of approval by both provincial and territorial governments in Canada and by the federal government of the country where the child lives. In many cases, adoptions must meet the requirements of the Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption.

With the passage of Bill C-14, parents of foreign-born adopted children were able to apply directly for citizenship for those children without first having to go through the steps of applying for permanent resident status. It was a clear and bold reaffirmation of the values and principles that define our identity, our country, and the notion of the Canadian family.

The goal of fixing imperfect legislation with the passage of Bill C-37 and Bill C-14 was essentially to simplify the complex rules on Canadian citizenship.

The private member's bill before us today is certainly well intentioned, and we once again praise the member for Vancouver South for his constructive efforts. In the coming weeks, we look forward to addressing the technical issues that would otherwise prevent this bill from achieving its rightful objective.

The government recognizes the commitment and sacrifices that Crown servants and their families posted abroad make to this country.

I am sure that hon. members would also agree that any children born to Crown servants working abroad should not be penalized by not being able to pass on citizenship to any children they may have or they may adopt abroad as a direct result of their parents' service to this country.

Furthermore, there is absolutely no question that Crown servants abroad, including our military, have a connection to this country and we are confident that the changes proposed by Bill C-467 are consistent with the intent of Bill C-37.

There are a few issues with this bill that need to be examined. For example, the bill attempts to extend access to citizenship to the grandchildren of Crown servants by adding a new provision for children born abroad or adopted by Crown servants.

At the same time, it proposes to repeal a section of the act that currently allows all children born to a Crown servant outside Canada to be Canadians, regardless of the generation in which they were born outside Canada.

Similarly, right now, anyone born abroad or adopted by a Canadian parent who was born in Canada, whether or not that parent is a Crown servant, may apply for a grant of citizenship. The criteria for such a grant respect international obligations that are there to protect the best interests of the child and that respect the provincial jurisdiction on adoptions. Under Bill C-467 as it stands now, children adopted by Crown servants would no longer have to apply for a grant of citizenship, which could indeed be problematic.

Nevertheless, I am sure that all members would agree that the bill has a worthwhile objective and that, as Canadians, we should support our Crown servants posted abroad, especially and including military families, and recognize their sacrifice, their commitment and their strong connection to Canada.

That is why I am confident the intent of Bill C-467 can be achieved by expanding the current exception that exists under the law to ensure that the children of Crown servants, including Canadian Forces personnel, like children born in Canada, would be able to pass citizenship on to any children they have or adopt outside our country.

To ensure that the good intentions of Bill C-467 are achieved, I look forward to working co-operatively in the coming weeks with the member for Vancouver South, and all members, toward some constructive amendments.

We have a committee that is currently working on Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act. We are working our way through it. As members know, it is never easy at committee to come to a consensus on absolutely everything. I believe that bill is going to come back to this House, is going to be supported and is going to be passed. For the first time in decades we will have strong and positive change to our refugee act.

At the same time, I think the committee, with all four parties represented there, can come to some common agreement on the bill. The member has a critic who certainly has an open ear and a colleague who has an open ear to ensuring that we do what is right at committee.

I anticipate that we can do the same with this bill. I look forward to the day the member has the opportunity to present at committee and work with us on what I think will be amendments, necessary amendments nonetheless, that would ensure there are no unintended consequences with respect to this bill and the impact it would have on Canadians born abroad.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Less than an hour ago Abraham Abraham was here, from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and my Liberal colleagues were pushing in support of the safe countries designation. I hear very clearly from the three witnesses here that they do not support that kind of designation and that this kind of designation would have serious implications for gay and lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered refugee claimants, especially from a lot of the African countries, or Jamaica, etc.

To Egale, and then to the rest of the witnesses, have you been able to communicate that concern to the Liberal Party of Canada? Both the Bloc and the New Democrats are onside in not having safe countries designation, and also in making sure there are humanitarian and compassionate grounds considerations, because these too will be eliminated if Bill C-11 passes.

So Egale first.

[Pia Zambelli, Member, Legislative Review Committee, Quebec Immigration Lawyers Association (AQAADI)]

I am here on behalf of the Quebec Immigration Lawyers Association, which has some 150 members in the province of Quebec. I have been practising immigration law since 1988, and I served for five years on the Immigration and Refugee Board, but the views I am presenting now are consensus views of the immigration bar in Quebec.

AQAADI's position, in a nutshell, is that the Canadian refugee determination system does not need Bill C-11. This so-called balanced reform package is expensive, controversial, and largely misses the mark. Canada's current refugee determination system as established by 1989 amendments to the Immigration Act of 1976, with its focus on a high-quality oral hearing before an expert independent quasi-judicial tribunal, is considered among the best in the world. The major problems that had emerged over the years since 1989 had been some dubious decision-making attributable perhaps to patronage appointments and the patronage appointment system in general, the lack of an effective error correction mechanism, and as of late, slow processing times at the IRB. Bill C-11 does little, if anything, to remedy these problems.

The IRPA, which is our current legislation, brought in by the Liberals, sought to fix the error correction mechanism problem by instituting the RAD. Unfortunately, it was not proclaimed in force; but it can be, at any time, with or without Bill C-11. The RAD is already in our legislation. Slow processing times at the IRB were a product of the current government's failure to fill vacancies on the IRB. That problem I understand is now resolved, and the IRB has all its members. The patronage appointment issue still has not been solved.

Instead of addressing the real problems, Bill C-11 seems to be principally directed to a problem that does not really exist: namely, a flood of bogus refugee claimants clogging the system. This is not a true premise, and a false premise should not be the basis for a reform.

The 1989 amendments to the Immigration Act effectively brought an end to floods of unfounded claims that we saw prior to 1989. Today, Mexican and central European Roma claims have been identified publicly by the minister as the culprits, but these claims are not bogus. Even the Federal Court agrees.

Other problems with the bill, aside from its faulty premise, are as follows.

The reform seems dependent on ultra-fast timelines. As almost every witness has said, such timelines are unfair to refugees, and have never worked in the past, in any event. The restriction in clause 4 on access to humanitarian and compassionate relief are unfair and may violate international norms. There must be some way for refugee claimants to raise any type of humanitarian issue prior to the 12-month period, in case something arises in their country of origin, in case they have a medical problem, or in case they have a problem involving the best interests of their children who may be Canadian citizens. AQAADI's suggestion would be to give humanitarian jurisdiction to the RPD or to the RAD, or simply allow for an application for an exemption from the 12-month bar in certain cases.

The institutionalized interview process in subclause 11(2) will cause delays and prejudice to refugee claimants even if it doesn't occur within eight days, even if it occurs within a longer framework. It's not a good idea. From an efficiency standpoint, it could cause scheduling delays because counsel needs to be present and an interpreter will need to be present. Furthermore, taking and recording a prior statement will mean that these statements will be routinely used in the full hearing to discredit claimants, as has been done, not in every case, but frequently with the port of entry statements. Initial statements made by victims of traumatic experiences may be incomplete or confused. AQAADI's suggestion would be to delete this concept of a formal interview process and stick with the personal information form.

The designated country provisions in clause 12, which restrict access to the RAD, present a host of problems. Designation will presumably be based on safety, but this is not specified anywhere, nor are there any criteria provided.

The fact that classes of nationals within a country can also be designated—for example, homosexuals from Nigeria, Jews from Russia—is clearly discriminatory. It's not just a country that can be designated. There's a power to designate classes of nationals within a country and deny them an appeal. This new approach for Canada—it might exist in Europe, but it's new here—is apparently a response to a crisis with respect to bogus claims from Mexico or central European Roma. However, since there is no crisis, there is no need for this provision. Should there ever actually be a crisis, existing disincentives to filing manifestly unfounded claims or other administrative measures will be sufficient. I am referring to the credible basis provisions in subsection 107(2) of the existing IRPA, and subsection 231(2) of the regulations under IRPA. As well, groups of claims have been expedited administratively in the past within the IRB. There can be an administrative decision to expedite certain groups of claimants.

The provision is also unworkable, as it will likely be impossible to get agreement on what countries can be designated. It should be deleted from the bill.

According to clause 13, the RAD will be implemented. In addition, a power to receive new evidence has been added. The RAD could be an enhancement to the current system, especially if a completely merit-based appointment system is instituted.

[Max Berger]

I'm not sure at what point I went off the air, but I was saying that if I had to choose between Bill C-11, the current legislation, versus the status quo, I would choose the status quo, given the restrictions on refugee rights we see in this legislation.

In my seven minutes, I want to focus on just four points that I see as the most egregious in this legislation.

The first point is on the eight-day interview. A lot has been said about it being a ridiculously short period of time, and of course I agree with that, but not much has been said about the abolition of the PIF.

Under this new act, the PIF, the personal information form, which has been the anchor document of our refugee system for the last 21 years, is going to be abolished for this interview. I'm of the school that if it ain't broke, there's no need to fix it. The PIF and the way the narrative is prepared, in a calm, civilized manner in a lawyer's office, is the best way for a claimant to prepare his story for the board.

What we're replacing it with is going to be similar to the port-of-entry interview, and we've all had terrible experiences because claimants are not sophisticated narrators of their history. The interview is going to come out all scrambled and jumbled: a story with no head and no tail.

If the objective of putting the person in front of an interviewer in eight days is to get hold of him before he has a chance to be contaminated by fraudulent consultants plying them with fraudulent stories in their community, well, that objective is not going to be served, because someone who wants to commit a fraud will just find a fraudulent consultant earlier, within the eight days. So my proposal is to just leave the PIF as it is and abolish the eight-day interview altogether.

The second point is with respect to the first-level decision-maker being a civil servant. I think it's a bad idea. The goal should be that we need the best possible decision at the first-level decision-making process.

In regard to the current GIC appointees, while I don't like the politicization of the process, we have members who come to the board with a wide variety of experience, having been on boards and tribunals in the past. What we're doing now is ratcheting down the quality of decision-making by restricting it to civil servants. I think that's a mistake.

My third point is with respect to the designated country list. Here, I'm going to suggest a compromise between the government's position and that of most of the refugee advocacy groups that are against the list, including me.

My compromise is this. If you are from a list country and you tell a story to the board that is true and you still lose your case, not on credibility, but because perhaps there's been a change of circumstances or on state protection or an internal flight alternative.... But if your credibility has not been challenged and you're from that list country, you should still have the right to a RAD, to the refugee appeal division. You should have as much right to the RAD as someone from a non-list country whose credibility is completely trashed at the first-level hearing.

The Czech Republic is a perfect example, because the Czech Republic is going to be the first country on that designated list. I do a lot of these Czech Roma cases. In almost all of them, their credibility is not impeached. They lose because the board seems to think that in the last year or two there has been a miraculous change in the government in the Czech Republic that makes it safe for the Roma claimants.

That's my compromise position here. So the RAD would be denied only to those people from a list country who have been found not to be credible in their history of persecution.

The fourth and final point, Mr. Chair, is that we have to make sure that no one falls through the gaps. Here I'm talking about the fact that there's no H and C and no PRRA within a year of the final negative RAD decision. There are two issues here.

First, in that one-year window, if new facts emerge that would shed a different light on the claim and demonstrate a real well-founded fear of persecution, what can we do for that person to ensure he doesn't fall through the cracks? Because I don't think our courts would countenance him or her being refouled. I think it's against our Charter of Rights and Freedoms. My suggestion for this is that in such an eventuality, the refugee board be allowed to have a motion to reopen the refugee claim. That was something that was proposed when IRPA was being contemplated, but in the end it was not adopted.

The second aspect of this--and this is the final point, Mr. Chair--is with respect to falling through the gaps. Not every claim of persecution is captured by section 96 or section 97, either by the convention refugee decision or by cruel or unusual punishment in section 97. I speak in particular about claims that are based on extortion by criminal gangs. Those are the kinds of cases, and we see a lot of them, where there are legitimate claims--these claimants are in fear for their life--but there's no nexus to the definition so they can't win under section 96. The courts have been ruling that those claims are based on a fear of generalized violence, so they don't fall under section 97. And under Bill C-11, those kinds of claims would fall right through the cracks. They couldn't win in the refugee hearing, and they don't have the right to an H and C, to a humanitarian and compassionate application. So we need to make sure that those kinds of claimants do have the right to H and C, and H and C based on risk, right away.

Thank you.

[Max Berger, Lawyer, Max Berger Professional Law Corporation, As an Individual]

Thank you very much.

By way of background, I am an immigration lawyer and I've been appearing before the board since 1989, the year of its inception. I appear quite regularly before the board.

I would characterize this act as one step forward and one step back. If I had to choose between Bill C-11 and the status quo, I would...[Inaudible--Editor] ...given the restrictions on refugee rights that we see in this legislation.

In my seven minutes, I want to focus on—

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

There certainly have been concerns raised over the designation of safe countries of origin where there are certain vulnerable populations. I appreciate how direct and open you've been on this. Do you think this concern is answered by the proposal in Bill C-11 that allows the minister to make designations specific to a population within a country so that they can be exempt from the designation? You gave a very good example of something for which we would certainly hope to seek exemption, in terms of a specific population in a country.

[Abraham Abraham, Representative in Canada, Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees]

Thank you, sir.

I'll go straight into my presentation, which I'd like to give in the interests of time.

Chairman Tilson, honourable committee members, ladies and gentlemen, the UNHCR appreciates the opportunity to provide comments relating to Bill C-11.

The Canadian refugee status determination procedure is one of the very few that the UNHCR holds up as an example to other countries. The necessity to provide fair and efficient refugee status determination procedures for refugee claimants stems from the right to seek and enjoy asylum as guaranteed under article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the responsibilities derived from the 1951 United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 protocol, from international and regional human rights instruments, as well as relevant executive committee conclusions.

As underscored by the UN General Assembly and the UNHCR's executive committee, in which Canada plays a significant role, physical access of asylum seekers to the territory of the state where they are seeking admission as refugees and access to procedures where the validity of their refugee claims can be assessed are essential pre-conditions of international refugee protection.

I would like to briefly review the various proposed changes to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

Regarding time limits, the bill provides for expedited timeframes, including the referral of a refugee claimant to an interview with an Immigration and Refugee Board official. While not specified in the bill, we are informed that the planned change is intended to include a data-gathering period of eight days, which replaces the personal information form process, schedule a hearing date, and complete first instance refugee status determination before a civil servant within 60 days.

The UNHCR advocates for fair and efficient refugee status determination procedures, including timely processing of asylum claims. Rapid processing should not, however, compromise fairness. It is important that a substantive written report be made of every personal interview, containing essential information regarding the application as presented by the asylum seeker. Based on the best state practice, the asylum seeker should have access to the report and whose approval is sought regarding the contents. Procedural guarantees for applicants, including access to information about the procedure and the assistance of interpreters, should be a right. Time limits should not unduly impact on asylum seekers' right to counsel and ability to collect and review information prior to hearings. Excessively short and tight deadlines can impinge on fairness. Best state practice ensures that the reasons for not granting refugee status are in fact and in law stated in the decision. This should be shared with the applicant to allow time to decide whether to appeal, including time to prepare and lodge an appeal.

In the UNHCR's view, it is important that decisions are properly substantiated so that the applicant can appeal meaningfully from a negative decision.

Regarding the use of Governor-in-Council appointees in first instance decision-making, refugee status determination undertaken by independent decision-makers is fundamental to the fair assessment of asylum claims. This should be carried out by staff with specialized skills and knowledge of refugee and asylum matters, who are familiar with the use of interpreters and appropriate cross-cultural interviewing techniques. Wherever possible this should be undertaken by a single central authority. The central refugee authority should also include decision-makers with training in the treatment of applications by individuals with differentiated needs, including women, children, applicants who are victims of sexual abuse, torture, or other traumatizing events, or individuals with mental or physical impairments that may negatively impact their ability to articulate a claim for asylum.

Regarding the implementation of the refugee appeal division, the UNHCR warmly welcomes the implementation of the refugee appeal division. In most countries that institute individualized refugee status determination procedures, claimants have the right to an appeal before an independent and impartial tribunal or body. This supports the right to an effective remedy in law. Such an appeal instance should have the jurisdiction to review questions both of fact and of law.

UNHCR recommends that the refugee appeal division should be available to all claimants, including those from “designated” or “safe” countries of origin. Instituting such an appeal mechanism will enhance Canada as a model. At the core of the refugee convention lies the principle of non-refoulement, whereby those with protection needs cannot be returned to a place where they will be at risk of human rights violations, persecution, or even loss of lives. The purpose of an appeals mechanism is to ensure that errors of fact or law in the first-instance decision-making can be corrected.

With regard to designated countries, the so-called “safe country of origin” list, UNHCR does not oppose the introduction of a “designated” or “safe country or origin” list as long as this is used as a procedural tool to prioritize or accelerate examination of applications in carefully circumscribed situations, and not as an absolute bar.

The safe country of origin concept is a presumption that certain countries can be designated as generally safe for their nationals insofar as it can be shown that there is generally and consistently no persecution, no torture, no inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and no threat by reason of indiscriminate violence in situations of international or internal armed conflict.

In such situations, it is critical that each application involves a personal interview and is examined fully and individually on its merits in accordance with certain procedural safeguards; each applicant is given an effective opportunity to rebut the presumption of safety of the country of origin in his or her individual circumstances; and the burden of proof on the applicant is not increased, and applicants have the right to an effective remedy in case of a negative decision.

If the safe country of origin concept is employed, there must be clear and objective benchmarks for the assessment of general safety and mechanisms, including review of changes, both gradual and sudden, in any given country.

Separated and unaccompanied children require special procedural safeguards, including the application of the principle of “the best interests of the child”, in accordance with the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child.

It may be that despite general conditions of safety, for some groups or relating to some forms of persecution, the country may remain unsafe. It is UNHCR's view that legislation should assure greater access to assessment mechanisms for those with heightened risk profiles.

A country cannot be considered safe if it is so only for part of its geographic territory. UNHCR emphasizes that the designation of a safe part of a country does not necessarily represent a relevant or reasonable internal flight alternative.

With regard to removal and to the one-year bar on access to PRRA and humanitarian and compassionate review subsequent to a negative final determination by the IRB, UNHCR guidance is that an asylum seeker should have access to a first instance decision, followed by an appeal in case of a negative decision. As good practice, there should be a mechanism for addressing protection gaps that may arise subsequent to IRB decision-making whereby individuals in need of and deserving of recognition as refugees, who are nonetheless not recognized through regular processing, can be protected.

UNHCR also notes that effective return policies and practices are essential to maintain the integrity of the refugee status determination procedures and asylum space and that it is appropriate for states to remove persons not to be in need of protection where they have had access to full and fair procedures.

With regard to assisted voluntary return, UNHCR supports the proposed assisted voluntary return program. UNHCR considers that sensitive counselling at all stages of the asylum process is necessary, including for those subject to removal procedures.

Chairman Tilson, honourable committee members, ladies and gentlemen, I thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

We're going to start again, ladies and gentlemen.

We have with us the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and Mr. Abraham Abraham, its representative in Canada. We also have with us Mr. Michael Casasola, a resettlement officer. One other gentleman will be here soon.

You can make a few comments, sir, about your thoughts on Bill C-11. We'd appreciate hearing them.

Mr. Abraham.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you very much.

I'll start off with one question to you, Mr. Van Kessel. You look like you've been around this game. Can you tell us whether the system that's being proposed under Bill C-11, all or part of it, has been used in other jurisdictions, and if so, what are they—everything, any of the issues that have been raised? I'm sure you're aware of them.

[Jordan Pachciarz Cohen, Settlement Worker, Mennonite New Life Centre of Toronto]

Thank you.

My name is Jordan Pachciarz Cohen and I am a settlement counsellor at the Mennonite New Life Centre. I'm also a law clerk. I work with a lawyer in Toronto preparing personal information forms for people's refugee claims.

First, thank you, Chairman. The Mennonite New Life Centre would like to thank the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration for taking the time for community consultations on refugee reform. We trust that the following recommendations will help inform your decision-making and amendments to this important piece of legislation in order to ensure that protection continues to be the priority in a fair and efficient refugee determination system.

I think we all share a common concern to have a fast, efficient, and fair system. However, there are several concerns that we do have with Bill C-11, and because of our limited time, this restricts us to only speak to a few of them.

Our first concern is with the designation of “safe” countries and the lack of access to an appeal for the designated safe countries. We believe this threatens to politicize the refugee system and compromise the independence of the Immigration and Refugee Board. We believe that individual assessment on the merits of each case is required without government intervention and without influence from authorities making designation of safe countries based on any political system. Also, it's important to note that claims from countries that are commonly thought of as safe are those that would most require an appeal process. This is because there are complicated issues of fact and law, such as the availability of state protection in countries that are generally thought of as safe.

One of the other concerns is the access to humanitarian and compassionate applications, and people having only 12 months after a negative decision to present a humanitarian and compassionate application on these humanitarian considerations. First, I would like to mention that many claims are not refused because of lack of credibility or people who are trying to abuse the system, but very many claims are refused because of the narrow refugee definition and are refused based on state protection, access to state protection or internal flight alternatives. The actual immigration refugee division or the refugee division is making a determination that people do face risk but not actually persecution, so risk should be able to be assessed at the humanitarian and compassionate level.

I want to give you some examples of certain situations that may be encountered by people who wouldn't have access to H and C considerations but who should. One is if a family arrives in Canada and makes a refugee claim, there's one member of the family who has dual citizenship because he was born in a different country from the country of persecution, but has never actually lived in that country. Another is if the entire family arrives in Canada, makes a refugee claim, are accepted, but there's one family member who is over 21 who is not able to be included in the permanent residence application as a protected person, and this person has no other family in their country of dual citizenship; they have no connection to that country whatsoever, and they would be sent to a place where they have nobody and have no idea of what the situation is there and they would be separated from their family.

Another situation could be a person who has a child with a permanent resident or Canadian citizen, and if that person is deported from Canada there should be humanitarian concerns for the best interests of the child to have both parents remain in Canada to raise that child.

There are many other different circumstances that could arise; those are just two examples.

I'm going to move on to the timelines of Bill C-11 and the eight-day interview. We fear that an interview with a public servant after eight days of making a claim will lead to poor decisions. How can one expect to gather accurate information when questions asked are not in a calming and trusting environment?

Refugee claimants require good advice in order to present their claim, and they're unaware of the laws and procedures and what information is actually necessary to mention and what is important to their claim. Very often they're given advice prior to arriving in Canada by unscrupulous individuals, and without receiving legal advice, they may present information that is incorrect and inaccurate.

In my work in meeting with people to present their claims and to put their personal information form into narrative form, often claimants believe they cannot mention events that occurred if they don't have the physical evidence to back them up. So they leave that information out because they're unaware that their oral testimony is of evidence and that's why their credibility is being evaluated at their IRB hearing.

There's fear of public officials. Often the agents of persecution in their home country are public officials, and to present in an environment where there's a public servant who's interviewing them, there's no building of trust, no time, and not a safe environment in which to present their case. It's not enough time to get psychological reports in place and put together accurate information regarding their claim.

I think Maria Eva is an example of someone who I feel would probably have had a lot of difficulty being accepted as a refugee with the proposed Bill C-11, the current refugee reform, and would probably not have been accepted without being given the necessary time to prepare her case. I'm going to let her present briefly on her situation.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

At the latest. That would be the time when we do clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-11.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

We have two more things to do, committee members, before we adjourn. I'll keep talking in public until someone tells me to go in camera, because I don't think it will take long.

You have before you two budgets. The larger amount is the expenses for the video conferencing for Bill C-11, and that's estimated to the end. The smaller amount is the expenses with respect to the Haiti issue.

Everybody's looking at me as though you don't know what I'm talking about. Do you understand?

I'd like a motion to approve these budgets and authorize that the amounts be paid. Ms. Chow and Mr. Karygiannis.

(Motion agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])

[William Bauer]

Okay.

I don't have enough time, really, to deal with all aspects of Bill C-11, so I'll try to concentrate on the aspects that have produced the most attention.

The designated safe country of origin is one of the more controversial aspects. It's been systematically attacked by I think every lobby group that's appeared before you, and indeed it is an extremely sensitive subject for some people.

Most of the EU countries utilize some form of this, which is simply an attempt to avoid clogging the whole system with manifestly unfounded or frivolous claims. The criteria for designating safe countries of origin set out by the EU council are very precise, and although those applied by individual countries may vary in detail and procedures, the fundamental criteria must be met.

There are many sources for determining SCOs, but I would mention two that are used all the time. The United States Department of State human rights reports are issued every year on every country in the world, including Canada. They are generally considered quite unbiased and objective, and they have been used for many years by the IRB and by counsel. The British Home Office also maintains a country of origin information service.

I don't think our government, in its proposal, is planning to have a very long list, but I agree very strongly that they should have a procedure for establishing the list, if indeed that's the way they go, that would produce a list that's accurate and objective.

One criticism that I've heard is that a system would be discriminatory and that each claim must be individually assessed. Even now, the IRB is using discriminatory procedures in its national streamlining directions, which allow for determination of claims from about 20 different countries without a hearing at all, with just a simple interview. I've heard no complaint from any organization about this, probably because it almost automatically produces a positive decision.

The original legislation also provided for a list of safe third countries, which envisaged rejection of claimants who on the way to Canada pass through a country that had a respectable refugee determination system, human rights, and all that. The theory was that anybody fleeing persecution would apply for asylum at the first place they arrived at, rather than shopping around for something they liked a little better. This received quite a bit of pressure, similar to what the SCO is being subjected to now, and in the end, it has never been promulgated, and I presume it never will be. There's never the political will to put this through.

On the question of timelines, we've talked about the refugee claimant talking to a civil servant for about half an hour within eight days of arrival. I don't see anything wrong with this, and the criticism strikes me as being very disingenuous. As it stands currently, he meets an immigration officer and has a port-of-entry interview, which is held under the worst conditions, when everybody's tired, when the noise is about, and with practically no satisfactory description of what was actually said. The eight-day period would enable a claimant to describe the case more thoroughly in a much better environment and then be set for a hearing of his claim in 60 days. I doubt if the 60-day target will be met, but it's a desirable objective, and it certainly provides adequate time for preparation.

Regarding the staffing of the IRB, I'm all in favour of staffing it with public servants. I've heard public servants criticized by many lobbying groups as being incapable of exercising independent judgment, as being anti-immigration, and as being generally inferior to almost any other pool of talent among the Canadian population. The criticism has arisen again during the discussion of Bill C-11, and I find all this criticism shoddy, offensive, and inaccurate.

I've worked with immigration officers for 40 years in various countries of the world, and I found them well trained, sympathetic, and fair, sometimes in the most difficult conditions you could imagine. They carried out the law of Canada; they didn't carry out ministers' wishes. I think that should be understood. That's what we're all trying to do—carry out Canadian law as passed by Parliament.

The worst bias and interference I ever encountered was from an order in council appointee to the IRB who had a very strong bias against any negative decisions. I've always argued against patronage in the IRB, and I've watched the attempts in the past few years to eliminate it or at least dilute it, and I have some hope that these attempts will be fruitful.

On the appeal division, the original reason for putting it forward was to compensate—

[Ezat Mossallanejad, Policy Analyst and Researcher, Canadian Centre for Victims of Torture]

Thank you very much.

I speak on behalf of a front-line agency helping survivors of torture, war, genocide, and crimes against humanity. I also speak as a front-line worker at the centre and as a former refugee who has gone through the process.

For 33 years the Canadian Centre for Victims of Torture has served more than 16,000 survivors from 130 countries. I am going to share with you some of our concerns.

Our first concern is about the provision of the interview at eight days. Based on our experience, 50% of refugee claimants who come to Canada have experienced war or torture. When they come here, they are highly traumatized. Most of the time, upon their arrival they are unable to disclose everything they have endured. This is especially true for survivors of rape and other types of gender-related torture.

Second, we submit that the provision of 60 days is neither fair nor feasible. Torture victims often require medical or psychological assessment about torture. Medical assessment sometimes take us two months because they need X-rays, MRIs, and so many things. Also, it sometimes takes me two months to get an appointment from a psychologist or a psychiatrist to assess the torture of a person who has come from a tyrannical regime. It is not at all feasible. How can we expect them to submit everything?

Also, survivors of torture and other international crimes develop a sense of withdrawal in regard to sharing their fearful experiences. This is true specifically about other types of gender-related persecution. Right now, we have the pre-removal risk assessment. We have H and C. We have some kinds of remedies for them, but I strongly believe that we should continue with H and C. Because if you deny them H and C for one year, it is no longer humanitarian; it is no longer H and C.

Also, there is the issue of the problem of safe countries, because we have certain survivors--from any country--who go through torture due to their sexual orientation. It is sometimes due to gender persecution and some types of harassment. I don't think we should just say that they have come from a safe country and they are being denied access to the refugee determination system.

Also, another issue of concern is the future of the Immigration and Refugee Board. Right now, we have a quasi-judicial system. On the question of civil servants, we don't know what will happen under the new bill. Experience from other countries has shown that some of these civil servants are not competent. They don't know, and they go with bureaucratic considerations.

Another issue is the principle of non-refoulement to torture. Under article 3 of the convention against torture, article 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and article 12 of the charter, we cannot send anybody back to torture to any country. That is also based on the ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada in the year 2002 in the Suresh case.

I'm afraid that implementation of Bill C-11 would lead to keeping new people in limbo, because definitely legislation like that cannot overrule Canadian international obligations as rendered in conventions against torture or Canadian constitutional provisions. What will happen if they have hundreds of rejections? Will we keep them in limbo? We cannot remove them. Limbo is also a technique of torture, and there are many tyrannical governments. It has also already led to the re-traumatization of our clients. I submit that the issue of refoulement to torture would also traumatize our present clients. They feel that Canada is not taking care of this important issue, and it might lead to re-traumatization.

I submit that this Bill C-11, if it becomes law, would impose new costs to the Canadian taxpayers for enforcement, removal, and detention, all those things.

Finally, I submit that since 1976, the Immigration Act has gone through amendments 52 times and it has not improved the system.

There is one main defect that I want to bring to your attention as respected legislators. It's the issue of linking victims' immigration and human rights and the issue of the need for an ombudsperson responsible to Parliament to hear grievances about the implementation of refugee acts.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting number 17, on Tuesday, May 25, 2010. The orders of the day are pursuant to the order of reference of Thursday, April 29, 2010, Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

We have three witnesses today, three guests. One of them is coming via teleconference from St. John's, and we're having problems hooking that up, but there's no reason we can't start with the other witnesses and hope that it will happen. So I will introduce our witnesses.

I want to welcome you to the immigration committee to study this bill and hear your observations and comments. We have the Table de concertation des organismes au service des personnes réfugiées et immigrantes, with Stephan Reichhold, who is the director, and Richard Goldman, who is the committee coordinator to aid refugees. As well, we have Action Réfugiés Montréal, Glynis Williams, who is the director, and Maude Côté, who is the program coordinator.

Each group has up to seven minutes to make a presentation. Thank you for coming.

We'll start with you, Mr. Reichhold.

[Peter Partington]

Well, in some cases, as I mentioned, Mr. Dykstra, such as the crisis we had a few years ago, we have reacted instinctively. We felt it was our obligation to do it. We spent the money that was necessary first, way above and beyond what the normal costs would be. And we went to the provincial and federal governments after the fact. But our taxpayers were there first, and we're pleased that we did that.

When we talk about the cost, as I indicated, we bear the cost proudly. We see the value of having immigrants, whether they come in as landed immigrants or refugee claimants, who settle in Niagara. And it seems to me, under this Bill C-11--we've done a quick estimate--to the extent that the number of days before the first interview would be reduced from the average of 14 or 15 down to eight, there would probably be a very modest cost savings, about $22,000, to the region. With respect to savings for social service costs through Ontario Works, they would probably be in the neighbourhood of $125,000 to $150,000.

But I want to underline that it's not the cost that matters but rather the importance to the people who are coming here to claim permanent status as residents of Canada. That says everything about their ability to start fresh in a new land quickly, to move ahead, to maintain their self-esteem, and to look after themselves the way they should. So even though I talk about the savings there could be, this goes directly to assisting immigrants, in this case refugees, in a much better way than what currently exists.

[Peter Partington]

Yes, and that's an excellent point. I made that earlier on. One of the things Bill C-11 will do is fast-track these claimants so they can start work earlier, can achieve their goals, and can get that sense of self-worth, which is being postponed under the current system.

Certainly in Niagara, with our Ontario Works program and social services, and having this tremendous tourism industry, we have people who are constantly reaching out to industry to find jobs for people on Ontario Works. One of the things we're pleased with--which is a little bit unique--is that the two casinos in Niagara tend to be a tremendous training ground and a step into a more permanent job for many people coming off Ontario Works in Niagara. So we're constantly reminded, and we do have a very strong part of our social services department working on that.

[Ted Salci, Mayor, City of Niagara Falls]

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.

I'd like to begin by saying that aggressive refugee reforms are certainly needed, and we see this need in our community every day. I can tell you that we certainly get people contacting our office and the local offices of our federal members for assistance with the immigration process, because it is lengthy and it is cumbersome. And some applicants are blatantly abusing the system.

Being a border community, we see people trying to enter our country to work, to live under our democratic laws, and for the most part to become Canadian citizens living in our cities. We also see first-hand the great efforts made by the Canada Border Services Agency to protect and patrol our borders, as many abuse the opportunity to come to Canada and attempt to take advantage of the social systems we have in place here.

Speaking from the perspective of a border community, as the mayor I can tell you that we rely on the free and easy travel of people into and out of our country. We recognize the great importance of allowing people into our country to grow our communities, to attract business and tourism, and to support our population.

We certainly appreciate the sensitivity of this subject. We know the crucial role immigrants play in building our communities.

I see the proposed amendments to Bill C-11 as a step in the right direction. To support those coming in and to tighten up the rules for those who currently aim to take advantage, we need to speed up the process for successful claimants so that people can get on with their lives in Canada. We need to weed out those who have untoward intentions and get them back to their countries swiftly and effectively. This legislative reform is certainly imperative. It's an opportunity to improve the system. The result will be that it will quickly become fairer for those who are negotiating their claims, as they will be taken care of in an expeditious way. And it will be fairer to the rest of Canadians, who pay for the social support systems that refugees without income rely upon.

The bill proposes to reduce the length of time a claim takes from start to finish. This will translate into a huge relief of the burden on our taxpayers. Instead of it taking an average of four and a half years for an unsuccessful claimant to go through our system and be removed from our country, under the revised law a claim would be processed in under a year. This translates, of course, into substantial savings.

The quick removal of failed claimants from the country would help discourage individuals from using the asylum system to try to jump the immigration queue to enter Canada. It would mean that unsuccessful candidates would not be supported by our social systems any longer than necessary. In turn, this would deter bogus claimants.

It's important to look at the savings that would result. It's estimated that each failed asylum case currently costs taxpayers approximately $50,000 in social service and health costs. With a faster timeframe for cases, this cost would be reduced to approximately $29,000. The savings for our taxpayers would certainly be substantial.

It will also ensure that valid claims will be processed in a timely manner so that successful refugees can get on with starting their lives in our country. They can get established, get gainful long-term employment, and start contributing to society in a meaningful way much sooner.

I support the faster process that will see claimants get their first interview within eight days of arriving in our country. Under the amended legislation, the first hearing will be 60 days after the interview. This is certainly a positive move. It is a distinct improvement over the current average of 19 months for claims to be heard by the IRB. Most importantly, the people who need help and protection will get it more quickly.

Currently, the U.K., Ireland, France, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, and other countries have a “safe country of origin” policy. By engaging in a similar system, we will be saving our taxpayers money and time. We will also be allowing those from unsafe countries an appeal process. Implementing an appeal process will allow new information to be brought forward by claimants from unsafe countries. All eligible asylum claimants, including those from safe countries, of course, will continue to have a hearing by the Refugee Protection Division.

With its commitment to increase the annual refugee target by 2,500 people, the new legislation will allow the government to help more refugees resettle in Canada.

Another benefit is that the government will be able to increase resettlement assistance program funding to $54 million, which will be the first increase we've seen in more than ten years.

Ultimately, I see the bill as addressing a need. It will help the people who are going through the system now. It will help those who need our protection to get it quickly and efficiently. And it will weed out those who are abusing the system and get them back to their countries without the extensive burden on our taxpayers that exists now.

Thank you very much.

[Peter Partington, Chairman, Niagara Region]

Mr. Chairman, perhaps I'll just take two to three minutes initially to talk about, first, the current process, which of course takes up to two years to complete and certainly has an impact on the ability of individual refugee claimants and families to establish their long-term goals and plans, six months to receive a work permit, and certainly an increased reliance on Ontario Works.

Ontario Works is delivered by the Region of Niagara, and it creates a negative stereotype for immigrants, being seen as placing stress on the taxpayer.

In the region, we support Bill C-11. We see it's intended to provide a smoother, faster process. Certainly the initial screening by the Immigration and Refugee Board will be held in Toronto within eight days of arriving and the whole process is to be completed within six months. So we see that as positive steps forward in the process.

We appreciate the contribution that immigrants make to the Region of Niagara. We process through the Peace Bridge entry in the region 600 refugee claimants a month. About 13% of them stay in Niagara, and the rest move on to other municipalities.

We believe the proposed bill will certainly make it much better for refugee claimants, the legitimate refugee claimants, in terms of settling; and of course it will help the Region of Niagara because it will reduce, to some extent, our hostel bed capacity. Currently, 15% of our beds are taken up by refugee claimants. As well, it will go some way to removing the burden on our taxpayers through the Ontario Works social assistance requirements. But above all, I think it is helpful to the refugee claimants.

Those are my comments.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Very well.

I would now like to come back to our representatives from the Centre des femmes de Verdun. In Bill C-11, there is a provision prohibiting a person who originally applied for refugee status from withdrawing, at some point, this application and to instead apply under humanitarian and compassionate considerations. As soon as you have filed a claim for refugee status, it is final, and it is no longer possible to make an application under humanitarian and compassionate grounds. We are in a context in which the government is claiming that there are organized groups that use people and encourage them to come to Canada to file bogus refugee claims. Do you not however find it somewhat counterproductive to tell someone who has applied for refugee protection that it is not the proper route and that he or she should rather apply for admission for humanitarian and compassionate grounds? Is it not rather counterproductive to prevent the individual from doing so and to tell him or her that the only path allowable is to go all the way with the refugee claim, even if it is not the right path?

[Geraldine Sadoway, Staff Lawyer, Immigration and Refugee Group, Parkdale Community Legal Services]

Thank you. My name is Geraldine Sadoway, and Rathika Vasavithasan is with me.

I'm a staff lawyer at Parkdale Community Legal Services. It is a 40-year-old clinic in Toronto that has produced some of the major lights in immigration and refugee law. In particular, James Hathaway was once one of our students at Parkdale Community Legal Services.

Rathika is a law student, but prior to that she was involved in working with immigrant communities. She's also a representative of the Tamil community that has been displaced. Her family was part of the government-selected refugee program, but she is part of a community that includes many people who came to Canada as refugees and claimed refugee status here.

I'm representing Parkdale, but I'm also representing the many workers in the community legal clinics in Ontario and other parts of the country who work on behalf of perhaps the most vulnerable immigrants and refugees who fall through the cracks of our current system. We deal with people who are often very deeply traumatized; people who have mental health conditions; women, children, elderly people; and people who have survived torture and other types of other terrible, traumatic experiences.

Law students in our program, such as Rathika, usually come with a very rich experience working with refugees and immigrants.

We're presenting today on the changes to section 25, the humanitarian and compassionate section of the act. Those are proposed subsections 25(1.1), 25(1.2), and 25(1.3). We are arguing that they should simply be deleted from the bill. These humanitarian sections will drastically affect the communities we serve.

They propose that a person will have to choose between making a refugee claim or filing a humanitarian application. In other words, if you make a refugee claim, you're not eligible to file a humanitarian application while your refugee claim is pending, and if refused, for one year after.

Moreover, proposed subsection 25(1.3) of Bill C-11 provides that if you do make a refugee claim, it is refused, and you manage to make a humanitarian application after one year, you can't base your humanitarian application on any of the dangers or risks you raised in your refugee claim. Furthermore, this section says that no hardship or risk factors can be raised at all in humanitarian applications if those same factors could have been the basis of a refugee claim.

This is the most dramatic limitation of ministerial power we've had since at least the 1950s. That's the act I can remember having reviewed a long time ago. But certainly in the 1977 and subsequent acts, we always had ministerial discretion to consider humanitarian and compassionate grounds, and that is now going to exclude factors that could be the basis of a refugee claim.

First of all, there's no efficiency in these changes, because with the current process we consider humanitarian claims in a different stream. They are dealt with by immigration officers, not by the refugee board. There's a paper application, not an in-person application. And the processing of such a claim does not stop removal. So there's no benefit. There's no efficiency in saying we're going to get rid of the humanitarian application.

If you have a pending humanitarian claim and you've been refused refugee status, you can still be removed from Canada. I know that; as a lawyer I've dealt with those cases.

You can only stop removal if either the immigration officer agrees to defer removal or you get a Federal Court judge to recognize that you would suffer irreparable harm if you are removed. We have done that as well.

What we're doing is setting out an impossibly difficult situation for the person coming to Canada who has left a problem in their home country. It will be very difficult to advise those people.

I'd like Rathika to hold up now for the camera a little image we made, a little Venn diagram. What you have is a large grey area of what constitutes a well-founded fear of persecution, which is the test for convention refugee, and what does not meet that stringent test but does constitute very serious hardship. So getting accepted as a refugee results in much stronger protection—non-refoulement. You can't be returned to the country where you fear persecution.

Accepted refugees and their family members are granted exemptions from certain inadmissibilities, such as financial and medical. But deciding whether someone should be found to be a refugee is not black and white. It's not an issue where you're a refugee or you're not a refugee. There are difficult decisions to be made, and that grey area is where a lot of the cases would fall.

Some cases that would be accepted as refugees by one board member would not be accepted by another, but they could be accepted on humanitarian grounds. We've seen many examples of this. I've set out examples in our brief of people who even the refugee board said at the hearing that what they're facing is very severe discrimination and it's a terrible experience they've lived through, and that's not enough to find them to be a refugee, but they have a strong humanitarian case. We have taken those cases and filed a humanitarian application after the refused refugee claim and quoted from the board.

The board can't decide on a humanitarian case. They can't say, okay, but I'm going to accept you on humanitarian grounds. But the immigration officer can look at what the board saw and that they found the person credible and accept them. Now we're just going to throw that away. We're going to say that all those people who have very strong humanitarian cases will either win the refugee claim or they're gone. You can't base your humanitarian case on the very factors the board said were strong humanitarian cases.

[Catherine Dagenais, Lawyer, Research and Legislative Services, Barreau du Québec]

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, first I want to thank you for your invitation. My name is Catherine Dagenais, and I am a lawyer with the research and legislation service of the Barreau du Québec. The Barreau du Québec has slightly more than 23,000 members. It main mandate is to protect the public. It carries out that mandate by ensuring, in particular, compliance with the rule of law, the continued separation of powers, the promotion of equality for everyone before the law and protecting the often precarious balance between citizens' rights and the powers of the state.

As a lawyer in the research and legislation service of the Barreau du Québec, I coordinate the business of the advisory committee on immigration and citizenship law of the Barreau du Québec, which consists of some 10 immigration and citizenship law practitioners. The committee analyses various immigration issues and has been given the mandate to examine Bill C-11.

I am here today with Ms. France Houle, member of the advisory committee on immigration and citizenship law of the Barreau du Québec. Ms. Houle was admitted to the Barreau du Québec in 1989. She is a professor at the law faculty of the Université de Montréal, where she teaches administrative and immigration law.

The Barreau du Québec's comments today concern Bill C-11. I will briefly outline the Barreau du Québec's position, which was developed in our letter of May 7. My colleague will be able to add any relevant information and answer your questions.

The Barreau du Québec is pleased with the significant effort that is being made in an attempt to find a balance between faster and equitable treatment of refugees. It is pleased with the implementation of an appeal mechanism for refugees. The Barreau du Québec had been calling for a genuine appeal mechanism for some time. This Refugee Appeal Division will have the advantage of developing expertise and a body of case law. However, some factors must be reviewed in order to prevent harmful effects on a vulnerable population.

The Barreau du Québec is particularly concerned about certain time periods proposed in this bill. The Barreau du Québec therefore proposes four weeks instead of eight days for the information gathering process. It also suggests a period of four months before the first hearing in the Refugee Protection Division. Refugees must be allowed time to find competent lawyers, to obtain evidence from their country of origin and to approach legal aid.

A competent lawyer handling the case will facilitate the processing of that case. These lawyers need time to prepare, to provide good advice and to represent their clients. Adequate preparation is therefore necessary from the outset. In addition, if there are deficiencies in the first hearing, the entire system risks going off the rails. The IRB's resources must therefore be cautiously used, avoiding numerous postponements.

According to the bill, first-level decisions would be made by officials. The Barreau du Quebec believes that the positions should be offered to everyone, both members of the public and people working in the various departments. Care must also be taken to ensure the independence and impartiality of the proposed first-line decision-makers.

Another major concern for the Barreau du Québec is the designated countries of origin and the possibility that the minister may designate countries whose nationals would not have access to appeal. The country-related criterion is shocking with regard to access to justice and equality for everyone before the law. The Barreau du Québec is opposed to this two-level appeal system.

Furthermore, if this solution must be considered, we must at the very least ensure that there are guarantees and a fair and transparent process for designating those countries. The committee must include independent experts with considerable expertise in human rights and humanitarian law, as well as public representatives.

In addition, and this point is important, the criteria shaping this process of designating safe countries should be clearly set out in a statutory instrument, not by order or regulation. These criteria should also be subject to comment.

As regards the appeal mechanism, the Barreau du Québec notes that appointments to the Refugee Appeal Division would be made by cabinet. The Barreau du Québec repeats that all political appointments must be avoided and that emphasis should be on competence in order for the proposed reform to work. In its letter, it suggests an appointment process that we invite you to consider. I would now ask Ms. Houle to talk about the suggested process.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Maurizio Bevilacqua]

I'd like to call the meeting to order and welcome everyone here.

As you know, pursuant to the order of reference of Thursday, April 29, 2010, the order of the day is Bill C-11, an act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act. I kindly ask all members to take their seats.

Yes, Mr. Coderre.

[Vanessa Taylor, Co-Chair, Centre des femmes immigrantes de Montréal]

Good evening.

I would like to start by saying that the Immigrant Women's Centre of Montreal applauds the present government's efforts to amend the refugee determination process. We understand its priorities in making the asylum system more efficient.

I agree with the minister that a near-58% refusal rate of asylum seekers over the last two years is wasteful, and an average waiting period of 19 months before first hearing is unacceptable. It is therefore vital to encourage the institution of a system that increases Canada's refugee acceptance rate, while significantly reducing delays.

However, it is our position that this reform should not be carried out at the expense of fairness. More specifically, it must not favour what some people might refer to as bona fide refugees--like those who are presently in UN camps, for example--over asylum seekers who may seem more suspicious and opportunistic.

We should not be privileging refugees overseas solely on the basis of a perception that they can more easily be processed and can better prove their claims of persecution to be well founded. If we sacrifice the lives of asylum seekers, who would otherwise become accepted refugees, by making it more difficult for them to adequately present their cases, it might prove to be more economical, but the cost would still be too high.

After careful review of Bill C-11 we find that certain of the proposed changes would especially handicap those seeking asylum from gender-based persecution.

I would like to express my concern about the following two proposed amendments. They are subclause 11(2), replacing subsection 100(4); and proposed subsection 161(1), making a preliminary interview mandatory within eight days of being referred to the Immigration and Refugee Board, followed by a subsequent hearing no more than 60 days following that interview. The other one is clause 12, adding a new subsection 109(1) designating countries of origin. Citizens would not be eligible for an appeal at the RAD.

Women, in their country, may suffer specific types of violence related to the fact that they are women, despite an appearance of democracy in those countries. Spousal abuse, trafficking in women and young girls, sexual mutilation, degrading widowhood rites, forced marriage, crimes of honour, sexual orientation and the maintenance of women in the state of minors are a few examples of that.

An obligation for these women to submit to time restrictions, with regard to an interview in the 8 days following the filing of an application for asylum and the first hearing within 60 days following that interview, as proposed in subsection 11(2) of the bill, could place serious constraints in view of the content of the experience of these women.

As some members of Parliament have already pointed out, for a woman who, for example, has been the victim of sexual violence committed by figures of authority and for whom it is impossible, in her country of origin, to even talk about that situation, it will be much more difficult to speak frankly about her experience to an official, particularly since she may not have had enough time to obtain good legal advice.

We understand that, if the official in question finds that the applicant needs more time to prepare psychologically for the interview and hearing, it would be possible to extend the time periods. However, how do you ensure that that official can in fact come to that conclusion if the woman in question has no one to defend it? Can we count on that official being able to read her thoughts? We don't think so.

That's why we strongly suggest to the authors of the bill, first, that they clarify the utility of this interview before introducing it, more specifically with regard to the record of personal information which, we believe, already serves the purpose that such an interview might have.

Second, if the justifications prove valid, we emphasize that the time period granted is sufficient to obtain the assistance of a legal counsellor.

Lastly, the creation of a list of designated countries, in our view, could result in discrimination against women. A list of these designated countries, from which some women seeking asylum come, would have the consequence of denying them access to appeal or a fair and independent hearing that would completely take into account injustices committed on the basis of their gender.

A possible solution to this problem would be to clearly establish the regulations regarding rigorous criteria for selection of designated countries, which would take into consideration the situation of women in those countries.

However, to ensure that our refugee determination system is fair for all, we ask that subsection 109(1) be repealed. This does not mean we aren't sensitive to the problem of countries that generate a high percentage of asylum refusals, but that we believe instead that the necessary time must be taken to propose an alternative solution that wouldn't cause harm to a given group.

Women asylum seekers often have no other possibility than to leave their country and to seek protection at the port of entry. We are seeking refugee status for women who are persecuted because they are women and because we are opposed to the twofold violence of an application processing system that would discriminate against women. That, in our view, would be a violation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and of the Geneva Convention.

Women who file a valid claim based on gender and individuals who file a claim based on sexual orientation and sexual identity will be major victims of this bill—

[Raoul Boulakia, Lawyer, As an Individual]

All right, and thank you for the opportunity to speak before this committee.

I'm going to state first of all that I agree with the brief that the Refugee Lawyers Association has presented, and given that there is so much to speak about in this bill, I'm just going to pick a few topics and not try to cover everything.

I agree with Professor Showler that the most important component of the system is the decision-maker up front. You want to have high-quality decision-making at the outset, which is what's going to ensure the integrity of the system, fair decisions, and efficiency, because decision-makers who are qualified and judicious actually do tend to be more efficient overall.

Although this bill is put forward as one that will reform the refugee determination system, I don't believe it really comes to terms with the whole problem of the appointments process. We're going to continue the existing GIC appointments process in what will be the Refugee Appeal Division, and the appointment process for first-level decision-makers isn't truly set out in a transparent way for Parliament to understand at this point. If the board does wind up, as rumoured, supervising some hiring process through the public service, there are no minimum criteria for the qualifications of people who are hired. Qualifications are very easily claimed without a serious vetting of whether people truly are going to be judicious decision-makers.

I believe that Parliament should come to terms with the issue of ensuring a truly arm's-length committee that does genuinely vet the people who are being appointed. This should be across the board at all levels of appointments to the tribunal. In Ontario, the Ontario Court of Justice has an appointment process that is respected and where the committee is made up of people who are truly at arm's length from government. Then the number of selections presented to government, to the minister, is so limited that there isn't the same kind of scope for not appointing the top candidates, as there is now.

With respect to the proposed process, the first aspect of the process will be an interview conducted at the board. Although it's professed that it should be an eight-day interview, I find it hard to believe that the board will be able to stick to that. We've seen this type of problem before. If it is truly done quickly, then, as Professor Showler has stated, it could be quite unfair.

The desire to control what the claimant states and have their first statement be one made to an official at the hearing I think is problematic. It's going to impair people, particularly the most vulnerable, from disclosing all of their information. I'm concerned about how that will impact on people as they progress through the refugee system.

The appeal system does not allow people to prove that they were telling the truth in the first place. That's a grave limitation. It only allows evidence that's quite limited. You have to basically adopt the same test that exists under the current PRRA, the pre-removal risk assessment model, where people often have been telling the truth, but if it's deemed that they should have known better or could have thought of presenting the evidence before, they're barred from presenting it. I think the purpose of the appeal should be to ensure that the appeal board does get the truth.

With respect to legal aid, at present the government and provinces have a cost-sharing agreement, which has essentially been a compromise that has ensured that legal aid has continued for refugee claimants.

In Ontario last year, about half of the funding for legal aid came from the federal contribution. Legal Aid Ontario is concerned about the cost implications of Bill C-11. Just today, they told me that they're coming up with cost estimates of what they believe Bill C-11 will imply for them, and they seem to believe that costs could go up by 50% from last year's totals.

Right now the cost-sharing agreement is going to expire in March 2011. This new system is clearly going to impose some new costs. Also, the CBSA is going to get substantially more resources and the hearing system is going get more resources, which is going to lead to more need for representation on the other side, and I am concerned that the bill does not balance that out or ensure that the provinces will receive adequate funding or encouragement to continue with their legal aid funding. A mulit-year commitment would be helpful to give greater stability to our provincial legal aid plans.

I'll leave my comments at that and invite questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting number 15, on Tuesday, May 11, 2010. The committee will be sitting between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m.

Pursuant to the order of reference of Thursday, April 29, 2010, we are discussing Bill C-11, an act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

We have three witnesses with us today. The first is here in Ottawa.

Oh, there's another person there. I assume Professor Showler will introduce her.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

But the United States has engaged in a war in Iraq that was not sanctioned by the United Nations. Some people who were born in the United States and some people who are not Muslims but are Caucasians do not want to engage in the war, and they have fled the war as they did back in the days of the Vietnam War. These people are here in Canada and they're fleeing a situation about which they say, “It goes against my religion to engage in war. It goes against what I signed on to in the war. It goes against what I thought this war was about, and for me to be sent back for a second tour, or else whatever....”

Shouldn't they be given a chance? But if we go down the scheme of Bill C-11, these people will not have the opportunity. Am I correct in this?

[Mitchell Goldberg]

But the Habs are the Canadians. I hope to think I speak for all of Canada now.

On a more serious note, I'm going to tell you what the Canadian Bar Association likes and does not like about Bill C-11. We support the principles of fast and fair. We think that streamlining the process is very important. We also think that an appeal on the merits is essential for fairness. The CBA has been on record about this issue for many years, advocating that section 110 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act be implemented. We congratulate the government on putting this in the bill.

We are also very pleased to see that there will be more resources for the refugee determination process. However, we also have serious concerns about sacrificing fairness. We do not think that you need to sacrifice fairness to have fast decisions and fast removals.

To begin with, the designated list unnecessarily politicizes the process. As Ms. Valiani said before, it has very serious consequences, in that people who are deemed to be on this designated so-called safe list would be denied this very important, very crucial appeal on the merits for life-and-death decisions.

We also, in our submissions, make suggestions to mitigate the damage this would cause. If this committee and Parliament absolutely insist on this process that we disagree with, in the alternative we think at the very least the committee that selects designated countries must be composed of human rights experts, and the criteria for establishing whether or not a country should be on that list must be completely based on human rights and state protection criteria, nothing else.

Just as we are against politicizing access to the refugee appeal division, we also oppose politicizing appointments. As you know, the Canadian Bar Association, with many other groups, has strongly opposed anything that deviates from appointments based on the merits. We think that the appointment process is still unnecessarily political right now, especially the reappointment process to the Immigration and Refugee Board.

At the very least, we think that the refugee protection division should be allowed to select the best possible candidates out there. And that means opening it up beyond the civil service. We have no problem with members being selected who are civil servants. There are many excellent members of the immigration division right now who come from the civil service, but we also should allow others who qualify to contribute their skills.

We are also very concerned about a part of this bill that I don't think has received any attention. Quite frankly it's even hard for immigration lawyers, or for anyone, to figure this out. We have struggled with understanding it. In our opinion, the bill provides for a very unbalanced, unfair, and unexplained stage implementation.

There are parts of the bill that could go into effect in up to two years after proclamation, and other parts of the bill that could be implemented immediately. We're very concerned that this could mean that the bar on applications on humanitarian grounds and pre-removal risk assessments could be implemented immediately, whereas the implementation of the long-delayed refugee appeal division could have to wait for up to two years. This would create a serious injustice for the people who are affected by this.

Like many others, we're also concerned about the delays that are not part of Bill C-11. The government has announced, as Ms. Valiani stated, that there would be an initial interview in eight days and a hearing that would be immediately scheduled 60 days later. As we said before, we are extremely concerned about the slowness of the existing process. Refugees need to have certainty. They need to have a fast decision.

Many of them are waiting to be able to bring their family members, their children, over to Canada. So of course we agree with speeding up the process. But we think that some minor adjustments can be made, such as 28 days for the initial interview and four months for the hearing. It's not a big change from what's currently being proposed, but we think it will help refugees who are very vulnerable and it will help people to be more likely to engage competent counsel.

Finally, we are concerned about the bar on temporary residence permits and also humanitarian and compassionate applications. On this last point, I'm going to talk a little about the bar on H and Cs, humanitarian grounds applications.

The humanitarian grounds applications are there for a good reason. When we argue before the United Nations whenever there's criticism of certain aspects of the system, or when there's concern about how to protect the best interests of children, for example, reference is always made by the government—the Liberal government, the Conservative government—that we have this process. It's called humanitarian grounds applications. It catches situations that fall through the cracks. It prevents injustices.

What's particularly noteworthy here is that humanitarian grounds applications do not stop removals. Unlike pre-removal risk assessments, there is no administrative bar on removals once a humanitarian grounds application is filed. On the other hand, their removal of H and Cs for refugee claimants will lead to human rights violations. I'd like to give you one example from my own law practice. There are many examples I could give, but in the interest of time I'd just like to mention a situation that's one of many.

I had these clients who were a lovely African family. There were two children and their mother and dad. The board member from the refugee protection division recognized their claim, recognized that they feared persecution and that they had gone through atrocious past persecution because of their political opinion. They were members of the opposition party. However, based on a technicality, the member refused the parents. Why? Because they had a double nationality. They were also citizens of another African country. But the children were only citizens of one country. So the member accepted the children. They were recognized as refugees, but the parents were denied.

Under what's being proposed in Bill C-11, the parents could very well be removed back to the country, while the children--and these were minor children--remained in Canada. Fortunately, they had the right to make an H and C application. They did, they were accepted, and I'm happy to say that the entire family is here together in Canada.

I can also think of many situations of women--and their children--who are victims of domestic violence by their husbands here in Canada. This has nothing to do with the Geneva Convention on refugees. It doesn't meet the refugee test, but these people are in a very vulnerable situation, and H and Cs are the only way to give them protection.

[Kerri Froc, Staff Lawyer, Law Reform and Equality, Canadian Bar Association]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The Canadian Bar Association is very pleased to appear before this committee today on Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act.

The Canadian Bar Association is a national voluntary association with about 37,000 members across the country. The citizenship and immigration law section comprises about 1,000 lawyers, with expertise in all areas of citizenship, immigration, and refugee law. The primary objectives of the organization are improvements in the law and in the administration of justice. It is through this optic that we make our comments here today.

For the purposes of our appearance today we have circulated to you the executive summary of our larger submission. We'll also be providing the larger submission to you in due course.

I'm going to ask Mr. Mitchell Goldberg, who is an executive member of the citizenship and immigration law section, to make substantive comments about the bill.

[Salimah Valiani]

Thanks very much.

We really appreciate the opportunity to give a deputation regarding Bill C-11, on the changes to the refugee determination system.

I work at the Metro Toronto Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic. We are a clinic that serves about 3,000 clients a year. Immigration law figures at the top of the types of files we open.

We offer legal services in Cantonese, Mandarin, Vietnamese, Khmer, and Laotian .

I would like to make points around four areas of the reform. First of all, we are very enthusiastic that there is a proposal to implement a refugee appeal division. Errors inevitably occur in the first instance, and an appeal on merits is necessary to correct errors.

We would urge that a merit-based selection process for the refugee appeal division members be laid out such that political appointments are avoided and high-quality decision-making becomes the basis for selection for the refugee appeal division.

Second is the area of humanitarian and compassionate consideration. Humanitarian and compassionate grounds are a necessary recourse to consider human rights issues including, for example, the best interests of the child. The distinction between what is a well-founded fear of persecution, which is the convention refugee definition, and very serious hardship, which is the test for a humanitarian and compassionate grounds application, is not black and white but instead grey.

One Immigration and Refugee Board member may accept a claimant as a refugee based on the same facts upon which another board member may refuse the claimant. How then are we to advise a client to choose between making one type of application and the other?

We have many cases of people from China who are accepted under humanitarian and compassionate consideration after being refused under the refugee definition--for example, people arriving for fear of persecution under the one-child policy.

Humanitarian and compassionate consideration is a safety net for those not qualifying as refugees but still facing disproportionate hardship if returned home.

The new system would likely drive such clients underground for a year or more as they wait to make an application on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. This would be detrimental to both clients and the system as a whole, and would waste precious time during which people in need of a safe home in Canada could instead begin the settlement process.

The third area I would like to touch on is the question of an interview after eight days in Canada and a hearing after 60 days. Most of our clients obtain legal aid certificates in order to be accompanied by a lawyer through the refugee application process. It is completely unfeasible to expect that these certificates could be obtained within the first eight days of arrival in Canada.

Claimants then without legal aid would have to represent themselves or become subject to representation by unregulated consultants who are often very unreliable.

Our clients additionally have language barriers, and it would be virtually impossible to arrange language interpretation services within eight days of arrival. If interpretation is inadequate, then the stories of claimants' risk become distorted, and that prevents a fair process.

In cases from China we have made claims on behalf of minors arriving in Canada unaccompanied. These are often complex cases involving trafficking and the sex trade. Such cases are on the rise. In the month of April, the McCarthy Tétrault Unaccompanied Minors Project received its 100th client.

Given the experiences of fear and trauma involved, we again doubt that effective interviews could be carried out within the first eight days of arrival in Canada. In many cases, 60 days to gather evidence for claims--that is, to prepare affidavits, translate documents, and obtain expert reports--will also be too little time.

In addition to adequate time to prepare for interviews and hearings, we need accountability measures to assure that the rights of unaccompanied minors and other claimants who have faced trauma or torture are protected in the system.

Finally, I have a point on the safe countries designation. The use of safe country lists politicizes the refugee system, and this thereby defies the very principles of refugee protection.

Refugee determination requires individual assessment on a case-by-case basis in order to guarantee fairness. Fairness will be denied to claimants from countries designated as safe, based on the Canadian government's subjective judgment of the socio-political situations in their countries. There are no objective or quantifiable criteria by which to determine countries as safe, and patterns of human rights change very quickly in countries.

This is likely the reason why the bill does not contain a definition of safe countries, which again underlines the political nature of labelling countries as safe and then denying full rights, especially the right of appeal, to claimants from those countries.

Those are the major points we would like to make. The emphasis on a fair process for all claimants comes back to the fact that if a fair assessment is not made, these are people who risk death and injury if they are returned home. So we would urge the committee to take these points into consideration, and would like to submit our brief in writing.

Thank you.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

There is another issue we have not had much time to address. Under Bill C-11, failed claimants would no longer be able to use a PRRA, a pre-removal risk assessment, to protect themselves against possible deportation if the situation had changed.

I know that the existing mechanism is cumbersome and not very efficient. What would you suggest that would be more efficient?

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you all for being here.

Ms. Dench, in your presentation, you talked about an alternative mechanism that would expedite the procedure in cases where it is suspected that there is an organized mechanism to bring people here, often to their own detriment. I believe you are suggesting that, instead of having designated countries, the Canada Border Services Agency have the authority to identify a certain number of case it considers potentially suspicious and to ask the IRB to process these cases on a priority basis.

Is that what you are proposing, and could you explain why you feel it would be better than the scenario in Bill C-11, both for refugees and for the system itself?

[Amy Casipullai, Coordinator, Policy and Public Education, Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI)]

Good afternoon.

The Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants, OCASI, thanks you for this opportunity to speak to you on this very important bill. I will unfortunately not be able to share with you in detail all of our concerns with the bill in the time that I have been given, pretty much like the other witnesses. I will therefore focus on some of the areas that are of greatest concern to our member agencies. We will be sending you a written submission on this shortly.

Bill C-11 is an important piece of legislation that would significantly change Canada's refugee protection system and have a profound effect on refugees. It deserves careful study and thoughtful consideration by this committee. Canadians deserve the time to be heard on this very important issue. One of our biggest concerns is the speed at which this bill is being pushed through the parliamentary process, and even through the committee process.

One of the things that refugees and immigrants arriving in Canada learn very quickly is the extent to which Canadian residents are allowed, and even encouraged, to have a say in the decision-making process of various levels of government. One of the things many have said they appreciate is being able to appear before a committee such as this, and many have appeared before you over the years to share their experience and have a voice in the discussion on important laws that would affect them and would affect future residents of Canada. We call this “civic engagement”, and it's something that we and all levels of government have actively promoted.

The process for Bill C-11 unfortunately is going to be one where there is little or no consultation and where there is little or no opportunity for those actually working with refugees to have a say.

OCASI is the umbrella organization for immigrant- and refugee-serving agencies in Ontario. Our member agencies include those that work with refugees who have experienced torture, that work with those from Mexico, Hungary, and other countries who arrive here seeking Canada's protection and file a refugee claim. They include organizations such as the Canadian Centre for Victims of Torture, recognized worldwide for their work with torture survivors; organizations such as the Roma Community Centre, which has worked for years with Roma refugees from Hungary and other countries; and organizations such as the FCJ Refugee Centre and many others that work with those who arrive from Mexico and other countries, seeking protection in Canada.

Our member organizations are working on the front lines with those who would be profoundly affected by the changes proposed in this bill. They can tell you first-hand how those changes would affect their clients. Unlike other opportunities, when important changes to Canada's immigration and refugee protection laws are before you for consideration, they will not have the opportunity to appear before you to share their experience.

On behalf of these member agencies and others, OCASI would like to tell you that it's not too late to take the time to hear from these organizations and others that work with refugees who would be deeply affected. As the standing committee, you're one of the critical components of our parliamentary system, intended to give community organizations and ordinary people a chance to be heard on very important concerns in a way that is fair and transparent.

In regard to the bill, we welcome the minister's stated intent to introduce a reform that is fast and fair. We welcome the creation, at last, of a refugee appeal division. We welcome the spirit in which it is introduced, the recognition that refugees, too, deserve a fair appeal process. The possibility of introducing new evidence is made available with what's proposed in this bill. Unfortunately, the appeal would not be available to all claimants from those countries designated by the minister as safe countries.

The Canadian Council for Refugees and Amnesty International have shared with you some of their concerns with regard to the proposed safe country list, and OCASI echoes those concerns.

We are particularly concerned about the potential impact on those who are seeking protection because of persecution on the basis of gender or sexual orientation, and who may be from other countries that are potentially deemed safe by the minister but who are still genuinely at risk. We are concerned that this process would become highly politicized and would then have an impact on refugees, with possibly tragic consequences.

We welcome the minister's proposal to speed up the process for those waiting to have their claims resolved. That's a good thing. Our member agencies can speak to the effect on individuals having to wait for years to have their claims resolved, and the impact of that wait. Therefore, we agree that it is a good idea to speed up the process, but our concern is that fairness could be sacrificed for speed.

Many claimants come from a system or a background where they may be unfamiliar with our refugee hearing process. They may be in circumstances where they are still terrified, in shock, likely not ready to share with a complete stranger the details of why they need protection. Many may not be able to recall the details, may not be able to put what happened to them together in a coherent way.

The point is that each circumstance would be unique and would deserve full and fair consideration of the merits, and we fear that the fast process would not allow that to happen.

Perhaps there may be some claimants who would be ready for an initial hearing within eight days, but there would definitely be some who wouldn't. Are we going to bring a bill, a one-size-fits-all system, when lives are at stake? Would it not be better to err on the side of fairness so that each person seeking protection has a fair chance to tell her story or his story?

Our second concern with this is that the decision-maker at the first hearing would be a civil servant rather than someone appointed by cabinet. The problem is that civil servants would lack the independence that is required.

Assigning the refugee determination to civil servants is fundamentally problematic because they don't have independence, but limiting the appointments to civil servants would also exclude some of the most highly qualified potential decision-makers from a different range of backgrounds who would be able to bring their perspectives to the decision-making process, and this would affect the quality of decisions.

This is something that we have drawn from the materials prepared by the Canadian Council for Refugees, of which OCASI is also a member. There is much more that we could say, but again, the limitation is time.

Unfortunately, Bill C-11will do nothing to address the current delays and backlog that's already in the system, presumably the reason it's being introduced. It will only deal with the claims filed in the future. Therefore, while we welcome the minister's proposal to address some of these major concerns, we would like to suggest that the problem with the current system is that it's starved of resources. So we welcome the minister's suggestion that he bring more resources to the new system that is proposed to make it work better. What we would like to know is why would you not do the same for the system that is currently in process?

We ask you as a committee to consider investing those resources in the current system while you take the time to study what is proposed with Bill C-11, to give refugees a fair chance.

[Michael Bossin, Chair, Anglophone Section, Amnesty International]

I want to suggest an analogy that's appropriate to the designated country list. Imagine a neighbourhood where there's a lot of crime, where studies have been done that show that 95% of everyone from this neighbourhood who is charged with a criminal offence is convicted. So the government decides to address this issue, and it brings in a law that says that people from this neighbourhood who are convicted of a crime won't have an appeal. They'll have their trial, they'll have their day in court, but if they lose, there's no appeal. That will reduce crime, it will discourage people from that neighbourhood from committing crimes, and it will unclog the appeal courts, because these people will no longer have an appeal.

On the surface it sounds pretty good, but I would suspect that no one on this committee would ever vote in favour of a bill like that. Why? Because it's discriminatory. Because it's unfair. Because it treats people differently based not on what they've done, but on where they come from.

We all know that under that system, even if 99 out of 100 people from that neighbourhood are going to be found guilty, one day an innocent person is going to come before the court and be found guilty, will go to jail, won't have an appeal, and an injustice will have been done. For that reason alone, I would suggest that kind of law is unjust.

Bill C-11 follows the very same logic, yet we are seriously considering passing this into law. Bill C-11 creates a two-tiered system for refugees, those who come from the countries with the good reputation and those who come from the countries with the bad reputation, and they are not treated the same. They are not treated differently because of what they did, they're treated differently because of the national country of origin--where they come from.

Of course, they still get a judicial review, but I would suggest that if a judicial review were an appropriate remedy, this government would not be proposing implementing the refugee appeal division for most claimants.

Amnesty International is in the business of monitoring and reporting on human rights abuses. Every year, people would like us to come up with a top 10 list of worst countries. I think if we did that, we'd be very popular and we'd probably raise a lot more money than we do now, but we don't do that. In our brief, we set out a number of good reasons why to do so is simply an unreliable method of determining which country is safe and which country is not safe. To do so would be irresponsible and unreliable.

Amnesty International is all for improving our refugee determination system.

Like all of the NGOs who are appearing before you today, we would happily work together with this committee and with this government to make that happen. But we are not all for making things worse.

We strongly urge this committee to take a deep breath, to consider the implications of this bill, and to reject what is unfair, discriminatory, and ill-considered. Take as much time as it takes to get it right.

[Claudette Cardinal, Coordinator, Refugees, Canadian Francophone Section, Amnesty International]

Good afternoon. We want to thank the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration for giving us the opportunity to share our concerns about Bill C-11, which is very important to people seeking asylum in Canada. We have only one presentation, but Mr. Bossin will speak on behalf of the Canadian Anglophone Section of Amnesty International and I will speak on behalf of the Canadian Francophone Section.

Our joint document will be submitted to you in a few days. Today, we want to talk about two points we are particularly concerned about: the designation of safe countries of origin and the rush to hear refugee claimants.

Under Bill C-11, a refugee claimant would be interviewed eight days after arriving, and the hearing would be held 60 days later.

We agree that refugee claimants currently wait too long for a hearing and a decision. But speed should not be the overriding concern in the amended act. What is needed is an equitable process, and we are afraid that speeding up the process, which is what Bill C-11 would do, will lead to incorrect negative decisions that could violate Canada's international obligations and put refugee claimants' lives at risk.

Under the current system, refugee claimants have the time to complete the personal information form including their narrative, information on their education and work experience, the names of their family members, previous places of residence and so on. Even more importantly, claimants will have the time to prepare a detailed account of why they are claiming refugee status, with the help of a competent legal advisor who knows the law and what constitutes evidence.

Often, claimants have to obtain medical, legal, police and other documents from their country of origin and have them authenticated. They must also have those documents translated here. Sometimes they have to find an expert witness. All that takes time. In addition, a very human factor has to be taken into account, and that is that claimants who have suffered rape, sexual abuse or torture will not feel comfortable confiding in a stranger they just met, if they are lucky enough to find an advisor quickly. Disorientation is another factor that has to be taken into consideration. Someone who has been here for just eight days and does not speak the language may not understand much. And more often than not, that person also needs an interpreter.

In addition to the short time frame, we are concerned that the bill does not clearly describe the purpose of this initial interview. Is it for information gathering only, or is it a substantive interview? And the parameters of the second interview—the hearing—are not set out in legislation, but in the regulations or even just in internal procedural rules.

Our concerns about the initial interviews apply to the hearing as well. Our concerns are set out in more detail in the document that is to come. We have three recommendations on this point: do away with the initial interview as described in the bill; keep the personal information form or change it to make it simpler; add the case to the IRB schedule when the person is ready to proceed or within six months of the case referral.

Now, Mr. Bossin will share his concerns about designating safe countries of origin.

[Wanda Yamamoto, President, Canadian Council for Refugees]

Thank you.

We welcome the opportunity to address you on this important bill that will profoundly affect refugees seeking Canada's protection. We have submitted a detailed brief of our comments on Bill C-11 and recommendations for changes.

Unfortunately, we will not have time today to discuss our concerns more than superficially. The speed with which the committee is rushing through the study of this bill undermines any capacity to have the thoughtful review that is merited. We remind you that you are dealing with a complex process that, if done wrong, can and quite likely will result in people being sent back to persecution and even death.

Unlike most proposed reforms to the immigration legislation, the government in this case chose not to consult externally. Our expectation was that members of Parliament would therefore recognize the particular need for a thorough study. We have been hearing strong expressions of shock and disillusionment from our members when they realize how rushed your hearings are.

Turning to the objectives of refugee reform, we believe they are clear and widely shared. We need a system that recognizes refugees quickly and discourages people who don't need protection from entering the system, or deals with their claims efficiently if they do enter it. Bill C-11 contains some positive elements, but also several serious faults that would put refugees, particularly the most vulnerable, at risk of being deported to persecution. Some provisions would also make the system more inefficient. A number of provisions would likely lead to a great deal of litigation.

On the positive side, Bill C-11 offers most claimants access to the refugee appeal division. An appeal on the merits is long overdue and absolutely necessary to ensure that mistakes are not made. We are also painfully conscious of the very long delays currently faced by refugee claimants waiting for determination, and we support the goal of speeding up access to a hearing.

On the negative side, the introduction of the safe or designated countries of origin is, in our view, a serious mistake. We sympathize with the objective of addressing patterns of unfounded claims, but we believe this is the wrong solution. If adopted, it will lead to injustice for refugees in need of protection. It may also cause unintended practical problems that will undermine the goal of efficiency.

Treating claimants differently based on nationality is wrong because it is discriminatory. Refugee determination requires individual assessment of each case, not judgments on countries.

The idea of safe countries of origin is drawn from Europe, where it has been extremely controversial. Many serious problems with refugee determination in Europe recently led to the adoption of the Council of Europe's resolution on improving the quality and consistency of asylum decisions, in which the parliamentary assembly, in Resolution 1695, called on member states to refrain from using lists of safe countries of origin

to ensure that each asylum case is examined individually with rigorous scrutiny of the particular situation of each applicant with respect to the country in question.

Under the proposed bill, nationals of designated countries would be denied access to an appeal on merits. They would also face a bias against them even at the first level, since decision-makers would be aware of the government's judgment on the country. None of this would matter if we could be sure that no individuals of designated countries would be refugees in need of protection. However, experience teaches us that, on the contrary, there are likely to be refugees among those affected.

There are few, if any, countries in the world that are completely safe. In countries that generally appear to be safe, women often nevertheless suffer serious gender-based persecution, and there are grave abuses against gays and lesbians.

The minister has said that his intention is to use these provisions to target claimant groups where there are concerns about abuse of the system. Yet if we look at the experience of recent years, we generally find that there are individuals within the groups who do very much need protection, even if most do not.

Take the Mexican claimants. They have come to Canada for economic reasons, but a significant number have fled for their lives. There are serious and widespread human rights abuses occurring in Mexico. In 2009, 516 Mexicans were accepted as refugees by the Immigration and Refugee Board. Denial of a fair process to these claimants may lead to their forced return to persecution, in violation of human rights law.

Depriving these claimants of an appeal is shortsighted if the goal is to have a smooth-running system. Often these claimants are among those who most need an appeal due to difficult issues of fact and law, such as the availability of state protection. This is the case, for example, with claims from Mexico where the Federal Court has repeatedly overturned decisions of the Immigration and Refugee Board because of a failure to apply appropriately the test of state protection.

The advantage of an appeal-level decision is that it could set a precedent for future decisions, allowing better and more consistent decision-making. It is possible that excluding claimants from the appeal may in fact be more expensive and time-consuming than granting them access to an appeal, since the Federal Court is likely to feel the need to scrutinize more closely the cases of claimants denied an appeal.

We note that there have been suggestions here that the legislation include criteria for designated countries. In our view, this would be more window dressing that would in no way redeem a fundamental flaw in the proposal.

I will pass it on to Janet now.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting 14, Tuesday, May 11, 2010. The orders of the day, pursuant to the order of reference of Thursday, April 29, 2010, are to consider Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

For the first hour, we have a number of witnesses, a number of guests.

From the Canadian Council for Refugees, we have Wanda Yamamoto and Judy Dench...or not “Judy” Dench--I'm thinking about somebody else, sorry about that--but Janet Dench, executive director.

From Amnesty International, we have Claudette Cardinal, who is the coordinator of refugees, Canadian francophone section; and Mike Bossin, the chair of the anglophone section.

Good afternoon to all of you.

Our fourth guest is not present, but I'm going to assume he will be soon.

Each of you has up to seven minutes to make a presentation.

We will start with the Canadian Council for Refugees, and I trust that one of you will speak.

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond, BC]

Thank you.

You also have given us some cases which demonstrate that our current asylum system is vulnerable to abuse. How do you think the measures in Bill C-11 will deter abuse?

[Julie Taub]

I don't agree either, because while I agree that the scourge of consultants is terrible and contributes to the abuse of the system, Bill C-11 is attempting to address the issue of bogus claims in another way: by addressing safe countries of origin and having them go through another stream, a speedier stream, to be dealt with. I agree with that.

As for the consultants, this has been a festering issue for a long time. I think it's going to take a lot more consultation with different members of law societies of the various provinces, as well as victims of consultants, before the government can come to some significant decision on new legislation. I don't think one should mix up the other, because the government has to consult with all the law societies and with those who were victims. I'm sure they can find thousands of them.

[Julie Taub]

I'm not sure if I quite understood. I gather what you're saying is that if we're not addressing the issue of consultants, we should not proceed with Bill C-11.

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond, BC]

Thank you very much to both of our witnesses today. Thank you for your time.

I have to address one of the remarks made by our honourable opposition here. We need to add something about the discouragement of bogus consultants in each bill. What do you think? We had similar challenges for temporary foreign workers. We had similar challenges for live-in caregivers who were cheated by consultants. We also had other cases.

Should we not, collectively, have one law to just address that program, which covers all the consultants, rather than what has been suggested just now, which is that if this is not directly handled in Bill C-11, then it shouldn't be there, that we shouldn't really approve Bill C-11...? I'll open this up to both of you.

Ms. Taub.

[Martin Collacott]

First of all, thank you very much for inviting me to speak before the committee.

Before making my comments on Bill C-11, may I say that I share with other Canadians the belief that Canada should give protection to a reasonable number of genuine refugees? I would add that some of my own family members, my in-laws, were boat people who fled from an oppressive regime. I got interested in these issues when I served as ambassador or high commissioner in various countries in Asia and the Middle East, where there were large flows of refugee claimants as well as immigrants in general.

We have to acknowledge, though, that despite public support for a good refugee system, there are major problems with the current system. The public is concerned about this and there is strong public support for reforms to the system, both to speed up the process for cases that have merit as well as finalize decisions and arrange for the speedy removal of the large numbers of claimants who are not considered to need our protection.

It's abundantly clear that a very large number of the people who make refugee claims in Canada are not fleeing persecution, but are, rather, abusing the system simply to gain permanent residence in this country, in most cases for economic reasons. Even though Canada is one of the most difficult refugee-receiving countries for asylum seekers or refugee claimants to reach because of its geographical location, we nevertheless receive a very substantial proportion of the claims made globally because we have the most generous system of benefits for claimants and, on average, we approve three times as many claims as other countries do.

In 2009, for example, we received over 33,000 new refugee claims. The UNHCR made a survey of 44 industrialized countries. Out of those 44, we ranked behind only the United States and France in absolute number of claims. Both of those countries have significantly larger populations and are much more geographically accessible to most asylum seekers.

In the time allotted to me, I'm going to concentrate my remarks on the provisions of Bill C-11 that deal with what are described as designated countries of origin, which are widely referred to internationally as safe countries of origin.

If members of the committee wish, I'll also try to answer questions on other aspects of Bill C-11, such as the use of public servants in the first or initial decision level of the determination process.

The term “safe countries of origin” is used to describe countries that are democratic, have a good human rights record, subscribe to the UN conventions on human rights and refugees, and are considered not to persecute their citizens. Many refugee-receiving countries won't even consider a claim from a national of a safe country of origin, or they at least have in place a system for dealing quickly with such claims so they don't clog the system and these countries can concentrate on claims that have merit.

Canada, however, until now, has been practising no such restraint and has allowed people to make claims who are nationals of a host of countries that would not seriously be regarded elsewhere as refugee producing, that is, that persecute their citizens as defined in the UN convention.

In 2008, for example, we allowed claimants into our refugee determining system who were Norwegians, New Zealanders, Australians, Germans, French, British, and American, and the list goes on. While the number of nationals from most of the countries I just mentioned was in most cases relatively small, some were not. In 2008, for example, more than 2,300 U.S. citizens made refugee claims in Canada. That's not an insignificant number when it comes to the time and resources required to deal with their claims.

Perhaps more noteworthy, however, are the sudden increases that have occurred in a number of claimants from specific countries, many of which would be considered by other refugee-receiving countries as safe. Most recently, these have involved claimants from Mexico, the Czech Republic, and Hungary, but there were similar occurrences going back decades and involving people from Portugal, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, Argentina, and Chile, etc.

This type of problem has arisen in part because of the way we've stretched the definition of persecution in the UN convention. Ironically, Canada some years ago warned the international community at a UNHCR meeting in Geneva that if the refugee definition is drawn too broadly, we risk defining the problem into complete unmanageableness, and that is what has happened, to a large extent.

The Canadian representative at that particular meeting went on to make the point that it was particularly unfair that we spend thousands of dollars each on individuals who manage to reach our territory whether or not they are deserving of our help, yet relatively little on those languishing in refugee camps.

In the case of the spike in claims last year by people from the Czech Republic, the argument was made by refugee advocates that although members of the community from which most of them came, that is, the Roma--or as they are sometimes called, the gypsies--weren't being persecuted by the Czech government, the fact that the latter could not prevent members of the population in general from discriminating against the Roma was the equivalent of persecution and, therefore, they should be eligible to make refugee claims. Under this expanded definition of persecution, we would be obliged to accept, for example, applications from the more than 100 million of the Dalit, or untouchable caste, in India.

Clearly, the refugee convention was never intended to deal with this kind of problem, and if the convention is to be applied in a realistic and practical manner, it cannot be interpreted in a way that results in us being expected to solve other people's social problems by moving all of their people in difficult circumstances to Canada. It's worth noting in this regard that the other members of the European Union will not consider a refugee claim from a Czech national, Roma or otherwise, since the Czech Republic is a democratic country with a good human rights record.

In the circumstances, it is quite appropriate that Canada establish a list of designated countries of origin, particularly in cases where there are rapid increases in claims from nationals of countries that do not persecute their citizens. In my view, the answer is clearly yes: we should establish such a system.

Until now, we've been reduced to imposing visitor visa requirements in such cases. This is a very awkward way of dealing with such situations and it usually brings with it a number of negative consequences, including adverse reactions from the countries affected, and it might include retaliatory impositions of visa requirements on Canadian travellers.

A further negative consequence of the ease with which virtually any non-Canadian can make a refugee claim in Canada is the extreme caution we often have to exercise in issuing visitor visas to nationals of many countries. When I was working at various Canadian embassies overseas, we frequently had to turn down visitor visa applications from people who were probably bona fide visitors but who we could not take a chance on because it was so easy for them to claim refugee status once they arrived in Canada. If we had a more sensible refugee determination system, we would not have to turn down as many visitor visa applications as we do now.

Now, will the provisions for designating countries of origin in the proposed legislation work effectively if indeed they're approved and implemented? That remains to be seen.

People from countries so designated will still be allowed to make refugee claims but will not be able to lodge an appeal with the refugee appeal division if their claim has been turned down. The expectation, presumably, is that this restriction will deter most such individuals from making claims in the first place. But should this not turn out to be the case, should it not be a significant deterrent, the government would be well advised to consider firmer measures to control the unjustified spikes from nationals of those countries of origin.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thank you.

You certainly can't speak to the policy that was worked into Bill C-11, necessarily, but to give folks an understanding, what are your comments, perhaps, on what the problems in the current system are and what your input was from a structural perspective on where change needed to happen?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Of course, until the bill is actually delivered through to royal assent and enacted, some of the perceptions and some of the thinking on this can't be implemented.

You made the point that the discussion regarding the financial aspect of this will obviously involve a great deal of time and effort on your behalf. You would acknowledge, though, and I think you did, that your involvement in this process ostensibly started 18 months ago. And really, from day one, the ministry has made sure that you, your department, and your organization have been included in terms of the research and some of the proposals that have turned into what is now Bill C-11.

[Brian Goodman]

Well, I believe that figure was provided to you by the minister, but there are a number of components, and we are simply one important recipient of the funding. There are others. In particular, there is the Canada Border Services Agency, so that it can do front-end security screening in cooperation with CSIS and, more importantly, so that it can remove unsuccessful claims. That is what I talked about earlier. You can't concentrate on only one part of the system because you create bottlenecks in the other.

The Federal Court is going to require more judges, because we will hopefully be getting some money to address the backlog of cases. That currently stands, as I mentioned, at about 59,000.

Now, it's important to understand--because you've read Bill C-11--that the transition provisions apply to the backlog cases when the new act comes into force, and that the timeframes that will be stipulated in the rules, it's clear from the legislation, will not apply to the backlog claims--that is, the 8 and 60 days, etc.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

You say that you deal with 25,000 cases per year at this time. Of that number, how many are accepted each year? How many claimants are accepted as bona fide refugees? Also, have you tried to estimate what the figure would be under Bill C-11? For example, once the system is stable--three or four years after implementation--how many people would be accepted, in both cases?

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

In your previous answer, you said that it might be worthwhile to consider hiring directly from the general public to staff the future group that will be created for refugees under Bill C-11. Do you believe there is an optimal target or threshold to aim for?

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Thank you.

First, I would like to make a comment.

You said that currently, under the present legislation, only .5% of first-level decisions are reversed at the judicial review stage. As far as I am concerned, this proves that this is not a real appeal system. Too much is the same as not enough. If too many decisions are reversed on appeal, that indicates there is a problem at that level. However, if none or only a few first-level decisions are reversed, that indicates there is a problem with the appeals system. That being said, I will leave that aside since we are here to talk about the future.

Let us talk about Bill C-11. Earlier, I asked you a few questions about hiring first-level decision-makers from the general public. Can you tell me what proportion of people are hired from outside the public service in the division where this model exists, the Immigration Division? Then, what would be a reasonable target for this type of hiring for the future Refugee Division?

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, Vaughan, ON]

Yes. You can understand why, as a member of this committee studying this bill, which will in fact either approve or not approve this bill...you play such an important role to this committee that it would be important for us to know the type of input you gave. Quite frankly, as a member of Parliament I have the right to ask what the chair of the Immigration and Refugee Board thinks of the bill, because we're here to study this bill. For us not to be able tot access that type of information concerns me.

But having said that, let me perhaps rephrase it so you can answer it. Having read Bill C-11, what do you think the major challenges will be for your organization in implementation of this? That's a fair question, right?

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, Vaughan, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Goodman, you said you were consulted by the government before the government introduced Bill C-11. I was wondering if you could share with us not all the points you've raised, but your top three top-of-mind points you made to the government, because in the final analysis you were a very important part of the architecture of this system.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

I'll just follow up on what my colleague was talking about. The difference between now and after Bill C-11, if it passes Parliament and the Senate, will be that rather than through the Governor in Council it would be through the public service association. What role would you play and how would that change?

[Brian Goodman]

I don't have the figures in front of me. I'll provide those to you as well.

I understood that we were here to talk about Bill C-11, so that's the only reason I don't have them with me.

[Brian Goodman, Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I appreciate the opportunity to appear before you to discuss Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act.

I know we do not have a lot of time today but, since this is my first appearance before the Committee, I would like to take a minute to introduce myself.

I have been a member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, the IRB, since 2001. Immediately prior to my appointment to the IRB, I was a member of the Consent and Capacity Board of Ontario. Before that, I was a senior public servant in Ontario, where I served as an Assistant Deputy Attorney General and Executive Lead for Agency Reform. Prior to that, I was Chair of the Rent Review Hearings Board and Acting Mining and Lands Commissioner. I have a Master's degree in Public Law.

Since joining the IRB, I have served in two of the Board's three divisions: first as a member of the Refugee Protection Division, then as Deputy Chairperson of the Immigration Appeal Division. I was appointed Interim Chairperson in March 2007 and I was formally designated in June of that year. I am honoured to be the chairperson of the IRB and to lead such a dedicated group of professionals.

Since its inception 21 years ago, the IRB has gained a reputation--both in Canada and around the world--for its innovative practices, the excellence of its adjudicative support and the high quality of its decisions. In fact, while in Ottawa last month, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Mr. Antonio Guterres, reiterated these sentiments. The IRB has also been recognized by the Federal Court of Canada and by the Auditor General for the thoroughness and professionalism of its training program for new members.

The IRB is Canada's largest administrative tribunal and our members make anywhere from 40,000 to 60,000 decisions annually. Our mission under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, as the committee knows, is to resolve immigration and refugee cases efficiently, fairly and in accordance with the law. We fulfill our functions through three divisions: the Immigration Division, the Immigration Appeal Division and the Refugee Protection Division.

While the Board is funded to finalize 25,000 refugee claims a year, as the minister indicated on Tuesday, the number of claims referred to the Board has consistently exceeded our funded rate for the past several years This high intake of refugee claims and an historical shortfall in the member complement have resulted in a large backlog in the Refugee Protection Division. Measures taken by the government last year to slow the intake, along with an increase in withdrawals and abandonments and enhanced productivity at the IRB, have stopped the growth of the backlog, which sat at 59,000 at the end of March 2010. And I am pleased to report that the IRB has recently reduced the backlog by approximately 1,000 cases, although I must stress that significant new resources will be required if the Board is to substantially reduce or eliminate the backlog.

The RPD is currently operating at nearly full capacity. As of today, it is one member short of its funded complement of 127. This is in addition to the 37 GIC appointees in the Immigration Appeal Division and the 30 public servant decision-makers in the Immigration Division.

All of our decision-makers receive extensive upfront training, mentoring and ongoing professional development, legal support, and country-of-origin and claimant specific research.

The work of an IRB member is difficult and demanding. It frequently involves giving testimony regarding torture or human rights abuses, and decisions are life-changing for the refugee claimants and their families. These factors, combined with the volume of work, result in significant pressures on our members.

I am proud of the way that IRB members continue to meet or exceed the expectations set for them. I believe that our success in this regard can be attributed to the practices, procedures and tools we have put in place at each stage of a member's career. It begins with the selection process, is reinforced during the training and integration phase, and continues throughout the entirety of the member's mandate.

Now I'd like to speak specifically about the proposed legislation, Bill C-11. As this committee knows, the IRB has no role in policy-making, as this is the responsibility of Citizenship and Immigration Canada, but I want to assure you that we have been consulted appropriately during the drafting of this legislation on all aspects that affect the mandate of the IRB. I also want to reassure you that the IRB will implement any resulting legislation professionally and effectively.

While we're proud of the work we do as part of the refugee determination system in Canada, the fact is that the public has lost confidence in the refugee system for reasons beyond the control of the IRB. The minister spoke about this on Tuesday.

The current system is in need of reform--the entire system--so that refugee claims can be heard and determined more quickly, and unsuccessful claimants can be removed more quickly, all the while maintaining procedural fairness. Bill C-11 is how the government has chosen to seek an improved system.

The main elements of the proposed system that impact refugee determination at the IRB include the requirement that a board employee conduct an information-gathering interview on a date fixed by the referring CBSA or CIC officer, in accordance with the IRB rules to be developed. At this interview, a hearing will be scheduled in accordance with the IRB rules, to be conducted by an RPD public servant decision-maker.

If a refugee claim is rejected by the RPD, all claimants except those from places or classes of nationals designated by the minister would have a right of appeal on the merits on all questions to the IRB's new refugee appeal division, RAD, staffed by Governor in Council appointees. The RAD would receive new evidence and, in certain circumstances, would hold an oral hearing. In the event that a negative RPD decision is upheld on appeal, appellants would have the right to seek leave for judicial review of the appeal decision from the Federal Court. The RAD, in addition to upholding an RPD decision, could substitute its own decision to avoid having it sent back to the RPD, or in rare cases may return the case for a rehearing before a new panel.

Members of the new RPD and the RAD, whether GIC appointees or public servant decision-makers, will be selected through a process that ensures they are suitable and qualified. They will benefit from a similar high level of ongoing training and adjudicative support as is provided to decision-makers at present. I also fully expect that we at the IRB will continue to find creative ways to make the system work in the most efficient way possible.

The IRB will remain steadfast in its commitment to high-quality decision-making and will continue to maintain the high standards we have set for ourselves. Above all, our thoughts are never far from the people whose lives depend on the decisions we make, as well as the safety and security of Canadians.

The IRB will deliver, to the best of its ability, on the requirements of the legislation as determined by Parliament, and we will do so within the timeframes given and within the budget allotted, fulfilling our mandate to resolve cases efficiently, fairly, and in accordance with the law.

In closing, I would like to say to the committee that, as it can appreciate, there are still many questions that need to be answered as we prepare for implementation after royal assent. We will have to develop rules and procedures, develop staffing strategies to meet the new requirements, and determine our fit-up needs, to name just a few.

Now I'd be pleased to do my best to try to answer any of your questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. This is meeting number 13 of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, on Thursday, May 6, 2010. For orders of the day, we have Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

We have with us today as our guests the chairman of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, Mr. Brian Goodman; the executive director, Mr. Simon Coakeley; and the senior general counsel, Ms. Sylvia Cox-Duquette.

Welcome to you all, particularly Mr. Goodman.

I thank you for giving up your time and coming to help us with this bill this afternoon.

I understand you have a brief presentation. You have up to 10 minutes.

Thank you again for coming. You have the floor.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

One of the things you did—and you mentioned it in terms of burning the midnight oil—was to travel across the country once the introduction of Bill C-11 was brought forward by you in the House, and you went from one side to the other. I'm wondering if you can comment on some of the reactions you received in terms of folks you met, whether they be stakeholders, whether they be media, whether they be those who may come here and actually be witnesses. Could you tell us the reaction you've received in terms of dealing directly with people on this?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

When Mr. Coderre was minister, and he was followed by Ms. Sgro and Mr. Volpe--they all expressed their sincere, I believe, intention to implement the RAD, but they all said it had to happen in the context of other broader streamlining in the system. I have all the quotes, and I agree 100% with what my predecessors said at the time. They were in a difficult bind, because it's not easy to come forward with a comprehensive but balanced reform of the asylum system. It is not easy, believe me. I've been working on this, burning the midnight oil for a year and a half on the policy details here, and this is something that department officials have been working on, frankly, for years, as Mr. Coderre will well know.

The point is this. Everyone has wanted to bring in an appeal division, but within the context of streamlining, and that's what we're able to achieve here. Through the moratoria on post-claim recourses for one year, through the faster first-level decision, and thanks to faster removal at the back end of the system, we believe we can introduce this additional level of administrative fairness in the refugee appeal division without further burdening an overburdened system.

I want to underscore that the refugee appeal division foreseen in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act 2003, and proposed, for instance, in Mr. St-Cyr's private member's bill, does not actually include, as does the RAD in Bill C-11, the ability to present new evidence and in certain cases to have an oral hearing before the appeal division decision-maker. This is an improved RAD. It's an additional level of administrative fairness, but it's not going to happen if we don't achieve the other streamlining in the system that the package speaks to.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Thank you, Chairman.

I'm quite excited to be here, to be working with all of my colleagues on what is a critically important piece of legislation that constitutes part of a broader package to bring balanced reform back to Canada's asylum system.

These balanced reforms will result in bona fide refugees getting faster protection in Canada, much faster than is currently the case, while those who seek to abuse our country's generosity would also, on the other side, be removed much more quickly. These reforms would also enhance the fairness of our system and would ensure that the asylum system actually exceeds our domestic and international legal obligations.

Chairman, as part of the package, we are also proposing to expand our refugee resettlement programs and increase the number of UN refugees and others, who are often living in camps or urban slums and are victims of conflict and ethnic cleansing...we would increase our welcome to those kinds of individuals by some 20%, or 2,500 individuals. We would also increase support for the refugee assistance program for the successful integration of government-assisted refugees by some 20%, the first time that program has been increased in a decade.

In essence, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act focuses on improving our asylum system. The act would introduce a new information gathering interview at the independent Immigration and Refugee Board, would provide for a hearing within 60 days, as compared to the current 19 months, and would also introduce a new refugee appeal division, something refugee advocates have been requesting for a long time.

I would be remiss at this point not to point out the extraordinary and admirable efforts made by our colleague Mr. St-Cyr. I know he was disappointed about the failure of his bill. However, there is finally an appeal section, which is even better than what was provided by the legislation in 2002.

This new appeal division would provide most claimants with a second chance, an opportunity to introduce new evidence about their claim and to do so in an oral hearing, if necessary. And, significantly, Mr. Chairman, the bill would make it possible to remove those who would abuse our system within a year of their final IRB decision.

Bill C-11 would also put in place authority to develop a list of safe countries of origin. Because I recognize that there has been general concern over this issue, I wish to focus my remarks today on the issue of safe countries of origin.

While I referred last week in the House to our current number one country for asylum claims, and the 97% of claimants who withdrew or abandoned their claims, there have been similar spikes in claims from other countries over the past 25 years. I am referring here to Portugal, Chile, Costa Rica, Hungary in 2002, Czechoslovakia in 1997. Each time, the government, be it Conservative or Liberal, imposed visas following spikes in asylum requests from democratic countries, which were almost all denied by the IRB.

A safe country of origin would be a country that is a principal source of refugee claims, the overwhelming majority of which are unfounded. These two criteria would be the starting point for even considering whether to review a country for possible inclusion on the list. There's nothing arbitrary about the process we propose. Countries on the list would be chosen in a way that is fair, objective, transparent, and reported to Parliament. They would be placed on the list only after a thorough assessment based on objective criteria.

Such countries would have a human rights record whereby individuals would be offered protection against persecution, as the convention says, for reasons of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group, and whereby persons would not face the risk of torture or death. This assessment would draw on publicly available reporting and analysis from a wide range of independent sources, including NGOs on human rights.

An advisory panel, including representatives from several government departments, would be established to provide advice on designations and advice to the minister. Input and advice would also be sought from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. The panel would also provide submissions recommending removal of a country at any time.

The list of countries would be short, with probably no more than a handful of countries on it at any given time. If you look at the current statistics, only a handful of countries that have a significant number of claims, the overwhelming majority of which are unfounded, would even be considered. The independent panel would then apply the qualitative assessment with respect to human rights practices and the protection of individuals. This is very important, because there are some misconceptions about this. All eligible refugee claimants, including those from designated safe countries, would continue to receive a full oral hearing before an independent decision-maker at the IRB, as they do under the current system, and would continue to have access to the Federal Court. We would continue to exceed our charter and international legal obligations with respect to claimants coming from designated safe countries.

While claimants from such countries of origin would still be able to seek judicial review, as I've said, they would of course not have access to the new RAD. This is because, Mr. Chairman, for the handful of typically democratic and rights-respecting countries from which we receive huge waves of unfounded claims, claims that are not happening spontaneously but are very often organized, we need some type of tool to accelerate the process, as most of the western European asylum systems have, short of having to resort to the blunt instrument of visa imposition, which successive governments of different parties have had to do. As I mentioned, most western European asylum systems have for consideration a country designation process to accelerate claims from safe countries. Mr. Guterres, the UN High Commissioner, said here in Ottawa that, “There are indeed safe countries of origin. There are indeed countries in which there is a presumption that refugee claims will probably not be as strong as in other countries.”

I should mention, parenthetically, that for several years he was Prime Minister of Portugal, where they have a very strong SCO system.

Mr. Chairman, I recognize that my parliamentary colleagues have also expressed concern about this aspect of my proposals, and that is why I am here today. I want to hear from members of the standing committee on this issue. I am extending a hand of openness toward my colleagues to modify the bill to address concerns. I am prepared to discuss the matter in good faith and transparency.

Colleagues, the safe country of origin is a critical tool to manage a spike in claims from countries that observe international human rights norms and obligations and that protect their citizens. The option is not to have a SCO process in the reformed asylum system or nothing at all; the option is to have that as a tool to deal with these waves of unfounded claims or to have access to one tool only, which is the imposition of a visa. I think it's important to keep that in mind.

I'm pleased to see how well these reforms have been received.

The Globe and Mail editorialized, and I quote:

Canada has a crying need for a revamped refugee-determination system, and it is to the credit of the...government that in a minority Parliament it has crafted a bold set of proposals that are fair and respect due process, while also seeking to deter those who would play this country for fools.

The Toronto Star endorsed these reforms, saying that this government “...deserves credit for showing the political will to act on an issue ducked” in the past.

The Montreal Gazette wrote that “Bill C-11...is a solid and sensible attempt...to kick-start a system that is wallowing in disarray” and that it “is a reform whose time has come”.

Experts like Peter Showler, former chair of the IRB and head of the refugee policy forum at the U of O, said, “It is even more difficult to design an entire refugee claim that is both fast and fair. The...government has done just that....”

But most importantly, Canadians support these measures by an overwhelming majority. By four to one, Canadians say that “...more needs to be done to quickly remove from Canada people whose refugee claims are unfounded and rejected”. Eighty-four percent of Canadians say that measures should be taken to reform the refugee system. And “81 per cent agreed that 'all refugee claims should be dealt with more quickly so that genuine refugees can settle in Canada faster and bogus claimants be sent home more quickly'”. This is according to a Decima Research poll.

Mr. Chairman, I want to close by emphasizing this.

I must say the amendments I am putting forward would help us maintain Canada's noble humanitarian tradition as it will allow for the protection of those that are persecuted while expediting the removal of individuals who do not need Canada's protection.

In closing, Mr. Chairman, I need to emphasize that should this bill not succeed in getting parliamentary consensus and being adopted, we will miss, frankly, an historic opportunity. I think everyone involved in this system, all of its observers, has recognized for a long time that there were some serious dysfunctionalities within our asylum system. It's not working well enough for bona fide victims of persecution. It's working too well, one could say, for those who come here who don't need our protection and who are able to stay for several years. It's not working for taxpayers.

It needs to be reformed, and if we want to get a refugee appeal division in place, if we want to be able to allocate more resources to resettle more of those who are in dire straits around the world, through our 20% increase in resettlement under the assistance program, if we want faster protection for bona fide refugees, if we want a tool that can help us to consider avoiding the imposition of visas in the future that are injurious to our diplomatic and commercial relations, if we want all of these things, Mr. Chairman, then I submit that this is a sound and balanced package that can be supported by all of those who believe in Canada's humanitarian tradition as a place of refuge.

I am happy to take your questions.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, the House is fully aware of the decisions that were made with respect to Mexico and Costa Rica regarding visas.

What I would like to ask the opposition is this. We have Bill C-11 that will go to committee next week to put in place some of the most aggressive refugee reforms we have seen in decades in the House.

I ask that member and I ask the opposition to support that bill at committee. Let us bring it back to the House of Commons, and let us have a vote and send it to the Senate before the summer recess.

Balanced Refugee Reform Act

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to stand in the House and speak to Bill C-11, known as the refugee reform bill.

I echo the message of my colleagues in the New Democratic Party and other colleagues in the House, who call for the bill to be returned to committee. Amendments need to be made to the bill to truly deal with the issue at hand. The NDP hopes that the legislation will create a fair and fast process when it comes to admitting refugees to our country and when it comes to upholding Canada's tradition of being known as a country of refuge for people who suffer a great deal in many parts of the world.

This is an important issue for me to discuss. I am the daughter of immigrants. My dad came from Britain and my mom came from Greece. They came to Canada, like so many others, for a better future for their children.

We recognize that the experience of people who come to Canada as refugees is one of even greater intensity in the sense that they have had to leave their home country, many of them in a hurry, to escape strife, whether due to war, famine, persecution, or whatever it might have been.

I grew up in Thompson, Manitoba, which was built by first nations as well as newcomers to Canada. Many of those newcomers came as refugees from countries around the world in order to help build my community and to build the diverse communities of which Canadians are so proud.

I would also like to note that this issue is of particular importance to me, given the upfront work that I did as part of Welcome Place. Years ago, while I was going to university, I had the chance to work with a very innovative organization in Winnipeg, Manitoba that provided services for refugees. It also facilitated bringing refugees over from the countries in which they were suffering. This organization connected them with their families and with faith groups that were willing to sponsor them. It truly provided that link.

I cannot tell members how many emotionally charged discussions I have had with family members and with people who had come over to Canada as refugees just recently. I had an upfront look at the challenges these individuals faced when they entered the system. I also saw the hope that they brought to Canada, a country that they know as being welcoming and open to diversity and aware of the role they can play in our country.

That is why I am so concerned about the bill before us.

We have talked a great deal over the years about the need to reform the refugee claimant system, the system by which they come to Canada. We are aware of the way the Liberal government hacked away at the system of supports, which contributed to the immense backlog of applicants.

We know more recently of the Conservative government's failure to appoint people to the Immigration and Refugee Board to deal with the backlog in a timely manner.

This legislation is an attempt to deal with a problem that is essentially built on the past neglect of the Liberal government. The NDP has many concerns about it.

One concern that has been made so clear is the reference to the judgment of safe countries, the idea that we would designate certain countries as being safer than others, looking at refugees on a group level rather than an individual level.

As has been raised in the House on many occasions by my colleagues, we need to recognize that kind of criteria overlooks some of the kinds of persecution some people seek to escape from around the world. Specifically, one example would be the gender based persecution. For example, a woman might come from a country that might overall be considered safe and we might overlook the fact that she has been a victim of tremendous gender based violence.

I go back to the idea that treating claimants differently based on their country of origin is essentially discriminatory. We have heard from many people, third parties, intricately involved in the refugee system. They say that the refugee determination process requires individual assessment of each case and not group judgments.

Another example of persecution that is overlooked as a result of these kinds of group judgments is persecution based on sexual orientation and the homophobia that exists in so many countries. We benefit from the laws and the rights that we fought for in our country. However, we know that while other countries around the world might adhere to certain human rights, in many cases there is great disrespect and in fact persecution of people based on their sexual identity. That would be overlooked in making these kind of group judgments.

A denial of these fair processes to claimants, looking at them on an individual basis, may lead to their forced return to persecution, which is in violation of human rights law. Not only would we be making these kinds of rules, but we would be returning people, who are seeking refuge in our country, to face the exact persecution that Canadians do not accept.

This area causes great concern for us. We would like to see amendments that would counteract these kinds of measures.

Another area in Bill C-11 that we feel is inadequate is it does little to address the problem of unscrupulous immigration consultants. Former Immigration and Refugee Board chair, Peter Showler, believes the expedited timelines will actually drive more refugees to these kinds of consultants.

Whether people are seeking immigration status or refugee status, which in many cases is the most urgent, some immigration consultants undertake the most unethical of jobs and prey on the vulnerability of those people who seek only to have a better life and seek only to come to Canada through the system. People are already frustrated with the existing timelines, but the bill does nothing to correct that. In fact, if anything, the timelines would be extended.

It is important to note that the bill has some merits in terms of establishing an appeal process for some refugee claimants, something for which we have been calling. We recognize that to be important.

We see more funding for the refugee board to clear the backlog. Much of the increased funding will be given to the CBSA to remove the failed claimants and to appoint judges. The NDP would prefer to see more funding given to hire permanent refugee protection officers to clear that backlog.

In my work with Immigration Canada, not in the refugee division but in more general immigration, it was clear the extent to which there was an increased burden on immigration officials. They were finding it difficult to deal with the demands made on the Canadian system. The solution is not to cut back. If anything, we do not need the quotas that we set for immigration. The solution is to look in part at hiring people who would do this kind of job to alleviate the work of those around them in the department and also to assist in this area more specifically.

New Democrats believe the refugee determination process again should be both fast and fair. We believe—

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for this question because, in my 10 minutes, I was not able to talk about all of the problematic elements in Bill C-11.

I spoke about the distinction between safe countries and the other countries, but there is also the problem of timing. It is obvious that it would be unrealistic to hold an initial hearing eight days after a person claims refugee status.

The member gave the example of woman arriving in Canada who had been a victim of sexual assault. Her world will have been turned upside down. Eight days would not be enough time for her to find a lawyer and build her case. As well, like others claiming refugee status, she may have had to leave her country of origin without the necessary documentation, if she ever had it, to make her claim.

There is absolutely no way that this eight day timeline can stay in the bill. We intend to propose amendments to make this timeline more realistic. As the member said, this timeline would not be workable on the ground.

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

We can only hope he will come back, although I doubt the hon. member for Outremont feels the same. My point is that we have been waiting for this measure for nearly eight years. This also explains, in large part, the injustice of the current system, which was never completed. I will come back to this later.

We believe that this notion of safe country is discriminatory, because it means that the refugee claims of individuals from so-called safe countries will not have the right to appeal their cases before this appeal division and will have to take their cases to the Federal Court, as is the case right now. We have already seen all the problems and concerns associated with such a situation. We saw the example this week of the pregnant woman from Guinea who, just a few minutes before she was supposed to board a plane for her deportation, was granted a four-month stay of deportation by the Federal Court.

Since the Appeal Division has not been instituted, they will have to keep going to the Federal Court to make sure that the new evidence her lawyer has uncovered is taken into account and she can get refugee status. In this instance, the lady was more or less fooled by a consultant, who did a poor job of preparing her case. She cannot appeal because the Appeal Division will not come into force until two years after the bill passes.

I want to remind the House that a real appeal procedure for refugee claimants should have been instituted as soon as the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act took effect in June 2002. The Bloc Québécois also had a unanimous motion adopted by the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration on December 14, 2004 asking the Liberal government of the time to immediately institute the Appeal Division.

Despite the adoption of this unanimous motion, the Liberal government did not budge, no more than the ensuing Conservative government. We therefore introduced private member’s bills, including Bill C-280 instituting the Refugee Appeal Division, which was introduced in October 2006.

We were back at it in February 2009 with Bill C-291. It is very sad that the bill was defeated by a single vote, 142 to 143. If it had not been for the notable absence of several Liberals, the bill would have passed easily. I hope they are asking themselves some serious questions in the Liberal Party. Is there really any difference between the Conservative government and the opposition? For my part, I do not think so. I like to say they are like two peas in a pod, but it is not very funny.

If not for the cowardice of certain Liberal members, the Bloc bill would have passed. We are glad all the same to see in Bill C-11 that the Refugee Appeal Division is finally being implemented. Once again, though, we think it is appalling that some refugee claimants will be precluded from the Appeal Division because of the distinction the bill draws between safe and unsafe countries. I think this is discrimination. We will ensure, therefore, that the witnesses who appear before the committee do what they can to enlighten the government and the members of all parties so that this regrettable situation is corrected.

In addition, the minister is playing with words when he says that the claims from people from safe countries will be expedited. The procedure will certainly be accelerated, but only because these claimants will be precluded from any recourse to the Appeal Division. As soon as the immigration official makes his decision, these claimants will be accepted as refugees or will have to leave, unless they take their case to the Federal Court. We will certainly take issue with this.

What concerns me the most is the fact that the bill gives the minister the legal authority to designate safe countries of origin. According to the government, safe countries of origin generally do not produce refugees, have a good human rights record, and protect their citizens well.

Sometimes, even in countries that are relatively democratic, people can be harassed or have their lives threatened because of their sexual orientation, gender or religion.

For all these reasons, we will vote in favour of Bill C-11 at second reading in order to study it in committee. I remind the House once again that we want to see the regulations before proceeding to clause by clause study of the bill.

[Pierre Paquette, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act.

First, I would note, as have some of my colleagues, that the refugee claim backlog, which has gone from nearly 20,000 in 2006, when the Conservatives came to power, to over 60,000 in 2009, is essentially a product of the delay in appointing immigration board members. The government is therefore primarily responsible for this crisis. Obviously, the appointments that have been made are not entirely to our taste. I am thinking of Pharès Pierre, for example, and his Duvalierist past. He is now an immigration board member, when numerous Haitians in Montreal have made or will be making refugee protection claims or applying as members of the family class. That is extremely disturbing.

It must be pointed out that the bill contains measures that are worthy of consideration, but it also contains disturbing measures. There is good and bad, and because the Bloc Québécois always works scrupulously, it has decided to send this bill to committee. We will therefore be voting in favour of the bill at second reading in spite of the reservations we have. I have to state immediately that we are expecting the minister to make the substance of the underlying regulations for Bill C-11 available to the committee. A lot of things are being introduced in this bill, such as the concept of safe country, that we do not know the concrete meaning of. The Bloc Québécois cannot give unconditional support as long as its questions remain unanswered.

The concept of safe country is in fact one of the items that seems most problematic to us. There will be good refugees, the ones who come from a country where there are flagrant human rights abuses. On the other hand, claimants who come from countries that Canada recognizes as safe, based maybe on purely diplomatic and geopolitical reasons, will be regarded as bogus claimants, even though they may have suffered intimidation and harassment, and even if their personal safety may be endangered. We consider this to be a discriminatory criterion that must be rectified when the bill is examined.

I said that we hope the regulations will be made available to the committee. To us, that is a need that must be met before clause by clause study of the bill. How can we agree to adopting a new concept, such as safe countries, if we do not know the criteria the minister will be applying to draw up that list?

On the other hand, we are quite pleased that the bill finally creates a refugee appeal division, which we have been calling for since 2002. That is almost as long as I have been serving the people of Joliette as their MP, given that I was elected in 2000. As I recall, when the amendments creating the refugee appeal division were passed, Martin Cauchon was the Minister of Immigration. He left this House a long time ago.

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, Canada purports to be a champion of human rights and in many respects it is, but there are failings in Canada's system and one of those areas is the refugee determination system. Now is the opportunity to fix those failings. Now is the opportunity to improve.

Refugees are not just people in need, they are people. They are part of our history, part of our present and part of our future. The life stories of refugees are informative, not only of injustices around the world but of injustices that occur here in Canada with a bureaucracy that can and should be more responsive, more sensitive, more accommodating and more reasonable to the situations in which refugees find themselves.

Who are refugee claimants? They are people who are often fleeing dangerous situations which often are political and sometimes are societal. They seek fairness and justice for themselves and for their families, the kind of fairness we sometimes take for granted here in Canada.

Canada is an extremely wealthy country, a stable country and a country built on human rights principles. Our refugee system is one of the ways we can actually demonstrate to the world that we can be leaders in establishing a fast and fair system. We should hope that our system is duplicated around the world and not derided.

What we need is a streamlined system that avoids backlogs and makes the right decision the first time based on individual merits and without unnecessary rules. We need a system that truly recognizes it is deciding the future of someone's life and which represents our domestic human rights policies to claimants.

New Democrats have a history of advocating for a better determination system, a system that is fast and fair. We need more independence in the system. One way to do this is to use an independent appointment commissioner to hire Immigration and Refugee Board members. Board members should really have relevant expertise. We need to clear the backlog that exists, and we can do this by hiring more refugee officers.

Time after time we see inconsistent decisions being handed down. There is too much discretion in rejecting claims and not enough discretion in accepting claims. We need to create an appeal division that uses law and fact in order to make consistent decisions.

Refugee hearings have been tainted by bad advice from dodgy immigration consultants. These consultants, as we heard earlier in this House, should no longer be invited to the Immigration and Refugee Board hearing room. We should have the resources that allow for proper and fair representation of claimants and provide them with legal aid.

The bottom line is that we should empower refugee claimants, not stigmatize them. How we treat refugee claimants is indicative of the values our country espouses. In a country built on the backs of people from around the globe, our policies should reflect those values of democracy, fairness, human rights and a minimum standard of care and concern for the lives of others.

Here is some interesting and telling context with respect to the contributing causes of our current claimant backlog. The government has greatly contributed to this problem. The concern it shows now is actually pretty late in the game, although we are encouraged by the concern it is showing.

After the election in January 2006, the government, for murky political reasons, stopped most appointments to the IRB and left many vacancies. This was a system that already had many problems, so it is no wonder that over four years later we have an even bigger problem, a problem that could have been prevented. Let us not kid ourselves; change has only been because of a report of the Auditor General. The report said that the system was flawed, was failing claimants and ultimately, it was failing Canadians.

In 2005 when there were more officers, Canada accepted 25,000 refugee claimants living here. For 2010, the minister is proposing to accept only 9,000 refugees in Canada. To fix a backlog that has been created, the government is proposing to use rejection of applications as a means to meet its targets. Simply put, this is a travesty of human rights.

This refugee reform bill is flawed.

The first flaw is the safe countries list which creates two classes of refugees, those with the right to appeal and those without. Where do we find the fairness in that? We should not let this type of inequality exist in a document that demonstrates our human rights system to the world. The safe countries list ignores the reality of things like gender-based discrimination and sexual orientation-based claimants. It is discriminatory. It is likely that many countries we deem as safe will fail a human rights test based on those two categories alone.

Equality rights have been struck from the immigration guide. Changes to the procedure of the refugee claim process should not follow suit.

The safe country rule discriminates from the get-go, and it does not take reality into account. A safe country is not prima facie safe for all of its citizens. The concept that a safe country exists ignores research, social study and first person accounts.

The second major flaw is that the first hearing is not done by people with any independence to the department or minister. Further to this procedural unfairness, which we have gone to great lengths to prevent domestically, is the limitation of access to pre-removal risk assessment within the first year after a refugee claim is denied. The result of this is that most denied claimants will be deported before having access to the risk assessment, as it takes close to two years to have that assessment decision, and this is unacceptable. We cannot have one type of legal or procedural system for Canadians and another for non-Canadians. It is unfair, it is negligent and it is contrary to our human rights codes.

There are several amendments that would make Bill C-11 more suited to the actual needs faced by refugees. The NDP is making proposals that are in the interests of claimants and which respect human rights and procedural fairness.

Those amendments include things like all refugee claimants should have access to the refugee appeal division. We need to remove the provision for the safe countries of origin in keeping with our human rights regime within Canada. Each individual's circumstances are unique and we should respect that. At minimum, the process for determining a safe country of origin should be streamlined and should reflect the realities of people from marginalized communities living in tolerant majorities.

Currently, some claimants can be removed before a PRRA decision is made. This should be stopped and the process should be speeded up from two years to six months. We need to review and provide an independent evaluation of the legislative changes after three years' implementation, and these results should be sent to CIMM and refugee advocates for discussion.

I would like to conclude with a few thoughts. Certainly, New Democrats support efforts to make refugee determinations happen expeditiously, absolutely, but the current plan that has been brought forward is insufficient and we do need those amendments. The plan does not reflect the realities of being a refugee claimant, nor does it adequately reflect that Canada's human rights regime is one of the best in the world, and for a reason: We do not purport to treat people in this country differently just because they are not citizens yet. That is why people want to come here. That is why Canada is seen as a land of equality and freedom.

Our refugee system should be entrenched in those values, the same values that keep me and my colleagues in the House safe every day. We are not a country of double standards or hierarchy and we cannot tolerate it in any of our legislation.

There are flaws in Bill C-11, but I believe we can make this bill better with amendments. I believe we can make it better for the reasons I have outlined, so I look forward to seeing it at committee.

[Meili Faille, Bloc, Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC]

Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak to the Conservative government bill that will have a major impact on the refugee determination mechanism. Bill C-11 amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

This issue is close to my heart, because as part of my main responsibilities in the House, I have criticized the immigration ministers one by one for the injustices that asylum seekers and refugee claimants from other countries suffer in Canada. Still today, many people come to our offices and ask us to help them. There is a great deal to be done, and this is a long-awaited reform of the refugee determination system. The current act provides for the appeal division, and we have repeatedly introduced legislation in the House to force Citizenship and Immigration Canada and the IRB to implement the refugee appeal division.

The bill introduced by the government does make some improvements. But some provisions of the bill raise questions about whether the government will achieve the goal of the reform, which is to put in place an improved refugee determination system and to deal with the case backlog.

We also wonder whether the government will put the required resources in the right place to avoid backlogs. It did not do so in the past, so why would it do so now? The refugee determination system has been extensively studied for years. Six years ago, in 2004, the Bloc Québécois condemned the lack of decision-makers and the fact that the government was slow to fill IRB vacancies. Despite the will of this Parliament, as expressed in the 2001 legislation, neither the Liberal nor the Conservative government has fully implemented the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. What is more, many organizations are leery of the government's intentions, because they have been fooled before and they do not want to fall for the same thing again. I hope the government is not trying to fool its partners by including provisions on the refugee appeal division in the bill. We expect the division to be put in place as soon as possible.

The minister does not need this new bill to implement the refugee appeal division. The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act already makes provision for it. Why should we believe the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism when all the ministers who have come before him have used the most vulnerable people, those who are looking for protection from Canada, to justify their inaction?

I can think of many examples of vulnerable people who have suffered because they were forced to abide by decisions that made no sense. As a member of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, I am responsible for, among other things, studying reports from the Auditor General of Canada, Sheila Fraser. She has been very critical of senior IRB officials and what they have been up to over the past nine years. Never in the history of the IRB have there been such long waiting lists. The backlog is unbelievable.

The Auditor General of Canada has warned the government about the repercussions of this ballooning backlog several times. Nothing has been done about it yet. Despite warnings and opinions from experts in the field of determining refugee status, the government has hamstrung the IRB in order to justify bringing in reforms with major shortcomings and ineffective measures.

Who let the backlog swell from 20,000 cases to over 60,000? Who delayed the appointment of IRB members and kept staffing levels extremely low with a shortage of, on average, 50 board members? I am sure everyone will agree that letting things get this bad is unacceptable.

The government wants claimants to have their interview within a week and their hearing within 60 days. The current system is paralyzed. It has reached the point where it can no longer function because the lawyers who represent clients before the IRB have no way of knowing when they will get a hearing. This proposal would add pressure to the system and would be very difficult to carry out. Interviews typically last four or five hours. Is a week enough time to collect all of the information needed for the hearing?

Currently, the information collected is often incomplete and not always useful to the decision-making process. It is not easy to make speedy decisions about who deserves protection as a refugee. That is why we need a mechanism to evaluate claims based on merit.

We must continue to invest in the quality of the initial decisions.

If a hearing is held when the applicant is not ready or the evidence not available, more bad decisions will be made and they will have to be overturned on appeal. It is better to take the time needed to make the right decision the first time.

Once again, the government is rushing through a bill without widely consulting the main players in the field. I maintain that a bill like this deserves thorough study, given the immediate repercussions on the way the refugee system operates.

We have been waiting for implementation of the refugee appeal division since 2001. Access to an appeal on the merits of a decision is needed in order to correct mistakes that inevitably occur at the first level.

In 2004, the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration unanimously adopted a Bloc Québécois motion requiring the federal government to immediately establish the appeal division. On a number of occasions, bills have been debated in Parliament to force the implementation of the refugee appeal division. However, we have reservations about excluding applicants from countries that have been designated as safe by the minister.

In the government's view, its proposals would reduce waiting times, which would benefit the people who really need Canada's protection. The government is publicly arguing that many people fraudulently attempt to enter or remain in Canada by various means. Also, according to this same government, these procedures are costly for taxpayers.

I challenge anyone in Parliament to confirm that the government's proposed model will be less costly and to submit studies to that effect. Which measure will deal with costs in Bill C-11? I have found nothing in the bill dealing with cost.

As for eliminating fraudulent claims, does the bill have effective measures to reduce their number? It has none. There is no provision to prevent these types of claims being received and recorded.

Inevitably, in its reform, the federal government is attempting to implement measures that have been hurriedly thrown together. I appreciate the minister's comments and I hope that we will be able to present an excellent bill.

They are speaking publicly about the concept of safe countries of origin. It is worrisome that the bill does not specify anywhere what is meant by the word “safe”. It is up to the minister to designate the safe countries of origin. Each refugee claim must be examined individually. How can the minister meet that requirement if he agrees to include measures for the processing of claims that discriminate based on their country of origin?

Refugee claimants from countries that are deemed safe face the risk that the government will decide that their claim is unlikely to be justified, since the country they come from has been deemed safe.

Nothing changes for claimants from countries that are deemed safe. They will have no right to appeal their case before the refugee appeal division and will be forced to take their cases before the Federal Court, as they must do now. No new evidence can be presented to support a reversal of the first level decision.

I invite all parliamentarians to have another look at the testimony given by senior officials from the Department of Justice regarding the staffing and performance of the Federal Court. They appeared before the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration and said there were no problems in that regard, as long as no new evidence, apart from procedural errors, can be presented.

I am deeply concerned about the basic principles of this reform. I am convinced that the proposed measures will not produce the desired results and that they will only lead to new problems in the end, unless the members of the House agree to a number of amendments.

Refugee claims must be processed in a timely manner. However, this must not be done to the detriment of the most vulnerable claimants. The challenge ahead is formidable: a decision must be made as soon as possible regarding the refugee determination process.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C-11.

I will focus my comments on the system overall. For many Canadians, and certainly internationally, Canada has a reputation as being a place that is welcoming and open not only to immigrants but to refugees. The NDP believes the cornerstone of any refugee determination system is that the process has to be fast and fair.

In some ways the proof of the system is in the individual cases. While we cannot go into individual cases here, as MPs, we are very familiar with the process as it relates to individuals cases in our constituency offices. I know, over my 13 years in this place, sometimes there is a sense of heartbreak of what people go through in terms of the refugee system, the appeal process, the wait times and the amount of stress and anxiety.

It is really important that we devise a system that is fair to people, a system that is not open to abuse but is fair and fast. This is a primary consideration. As one my colleagues said earlier, we want to ensure that each case is dealt with on its merits. It is very easy to make generalizations.

The NDP has always advocated for a fair and fast refugee determination process. We believe part of that program should be that all appointments to the IRB should be done by an independent appointment commissioner, with very clear criteria for expertise in refugee and immigration matters. It should be a merit-based appointment.

I know that one of our former colleagues, Ed Broadbent, laid out a very clear process for doing this. Unfortunately, it was not adopted by the government. We got to the point where we were so fed up with these kinds of political appointments on very important boards such as the IRB. It is very important to have criteria and to have a merit-based appointment.

I also agree, as my other colleagues have said today, it is important that we ensure the system does not allow unscrupulous immigration consultants to, in effect, exploit people's hardship, anxiety and stress. Ensuring the system works in a way that there is proper legal aid representation for claimants is very important. Unfortunately we do not see measures to that effect.

We also believe it is very important there be an emphasis on clearing the backlog that has accumulated by hiring refugee protection officers to focus on this. I think every government I have ever heard since I have been here has claimed that it wants to address this issue, but it never gets addressed. This is very important to us.

We also think it is very important to set up the refugee appeal division so consistent decisions can be made based on law and fact. We know Parliament has mandated such an appeal division. Since 2001, it has been ignored. There are some provisions in the bill today that would allow this to go forward, but we have concerns about it as well.

To us, the right to appeal is an essential and fundamental element of a fair process. This must be fully contained within the bill and the implementation.

While we agree there are some merits to the bill, such as it seeks to speed things up and it provides more funding, it appears that much of the increased funding would go to the Canada Border Services Agency to remove failed claimants and to the justice department to appoint more federal court judges.

It is also important to note that the required funding needs to be given to hire permanent refugee protection officers to clear the backlog, as I mentioned earlier. Where that money goes in the system and whether it is actually to deal with the individual cases and to help people deal with the processing is very important.

We also have very serious concerns about the bill, and I think this has been articulated very well in the House during the debate on the bill by various parties. The bill would create a refugee claims process that includes the safe countries of origin. Our understanding is that would give the minister the power to create two classes of refugees, those with the right to appeal and those without.

I deal with quite a few organizations in my community that are very knowledgeable. They are advocacy organizations and they have looked over the bill and commented on it. The Rainbow Refugee Committee in Vancouver has done incredible work on helping claimants who are fleeing persecution based on sexual orientation or gender identity and it has very serious concerns. I will quote from its letter to the minister. It states:

—based on a decade of on-the-ground experience with refugees who are making SOGI-based claims, we are deeply concerned about other aspects of the proposed legislation. Our members have fled countries where they have been under surveillance, arrested, imprisoned, extorted, and for some, tortured, because of their sexuality or gender identity. Many have been physically and/or sexually assaulted, often by police or other officials charged with maintaining religious or morality laws. Survival has required keeping silent, being vigilant and remaining hidden.

The organization goes on to state:

Asking those people who have left these kinds of conditions to tell their story to an anonymous government official within eight days, and then rendering a decision within 60 days undermines their chance for a fair decision. People who have lived a stigmatized identity and who have experienced trauma, need time and trust before they can speak about their experiences.

That is one example of some of the concerns about the process now contained in the bill to be implemented, if it is approved. These organizations are very familiar with the history of refugee claims and deal with individual cases and act as advocates. They need to be listened to very closely.

We also know that Amnesty International, speaking on this same question of the safe countries of origin, has pointed out that:

—over the course of nearly fifty years of human rights research around the world we have consistently highlighted it is not possible to definitively categorize countries as safe or unsafe when it comes to human rights. We are also very concerned that decisions about which countries to include on any such “safe country of origin” list will almost inevitably be influenced by considerations other than human rights, including trading relationships and security cooperation with other governments.

I believe this is a very serious question and any bill that confers discretion and power on the minister, especially something as fundamental as a refugee system, and gives the minister the power to say that one country is a country of safe origin and that this one is not could potentially be very problematic. I know there is a lot of concern in the community about the centralization of power to the minister and we want to ensure it is addressed when the bill goes to committee.

The New Democrats believe the refugee determination process should be both fast and fair. There is still debate about whether the bill meets that criteria. We certainly support the intention to streamline and speed up the process, but there are provisions in the bill that would still prevent all refugee claimants from being treated fairly and equally.

In committee we will look to amending this flawed bill to ensure that all refugee claimants receive fair and equal treatment by eliminating the safe countries of origin clause. We hope the government, as it has said, will work in good faith with opposition parties and include some of the groups I have mentioned.

There are certainly others. The Canadian Council for Refugees would be a major one. These people are experts. They know the system. They know what it is like on the ground. They know about helping people with no vested interest. They do not make money out of this. They are not the consultants who can sometimes be very unscrupulous.

It will be very important when the bill goes to committee that we hear from some of these key witnesses. If the bill is about producing a better system, then the proof of that will be in listening to those key organizations and ensuring their concerns are addressed. We are prepared to do that. We are prepared to have this bill go to committee. We are prepared to have that serious discussion at committee and get right into it in a detailed way. That is what the legislative process should be about. At the end of the day, we must ensure that this idea that Canada has a good reputation is actually reflected in the legislation before us.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, Bill C-11 would do very little to deal with the problem of unscrupulous immigration consultants. In fact, former Immigration and Refugee Board chair, Peter Showler, believes the expedited timelines could actually drive more refugees to consultants, so that defeats the purpose. If we are trying to put some rules and regulations on these immigration consultants, this bill may assist them in gaining more business.

Does the member have any ideas on how we could improve the rules on immigration consultants?

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-11 on immigration.

The Bloc Québécois sees problems with the refugee appeal division. It has always insisted on a mechanism to review refugee decisions.

At first glance, this bill unfortunately leads us to believe that it is based on the typical Conservative ideology whereby we have the good on one side and the bad on the other. This raises concerns about things working properly in future, especially since the bill contains a number of elements governed by regulation. To govern by regulation means that the minister of the moment—not necessarily the current minister—could want to influence decisions.

This bill makes it look like we are attacking the problem of false refugee claimants. This reform is based on a discriminatory principle and one that is fundamentally detrimental for refugees.

I would like to remind the House that people have a right to refugee status. It is a fundamental international right based on the solidarity among peoples and countries. Refugee status is not something to be considered with a certain amount of paternalism. Because our country is richer, it can start distinguishing the genuine claimants from the false ones? That is rather frightening.

Countries often benefit from the refugees they take in. For example, the refugees in France, England, Spain and Italy have made tremendous intellectual contributions and helped these countries broaden their horizons. There have been some major waves of immigration. Refugees left Russia to go to France and England. They made an enormous contribution to their chosen lands. Refugees are often very talented people. We are not talking here about minor immigration. Refugees are people who had to leave their countries because their lives had become untenable.

There were some Chileans who had to leave their country. Would we have considered Chile a good country or a bad one when some people had to leave because of the dictatorial regime that took over? Even some members of the Chilean parliament had to leave and seek refuge in Quebec. We had an extraordinary colony of engineers, writers and musicians, who were all refugees.

Would a bill like this one, but with regulations, have been able to distinguish between false claimants—because there were some—and genuine ones? Can a piece of legislation draw this distinction? I do not think so.

The committee should work very hard on this issue. We should not exclude people who come from countries like Chile. When the dictatorial regime overthrew Allende, I think we would have concluded that Chile respected human rights—not at the very time of the coup but a few months later—and that people there were treated fairly.

In fact, though, people were harassed in the exercise of their duties. They were harassed psychologically because they did not support the new ideology. As I said earlier, some of these people were very talented members of the previous government, while others actually supported Pinochet but were taking advantage of the situation to move to a country where life was especially good.

I provide this example because even though I know the minister is well intended, he will not always be there. There will be other ministers. How will they be able to decide which of the immigrants from a particular country are the good ones and which are the bad? That will be a major problem if we try to distinguish the good immigrants from the bad ones solely on the basis of their country of origin.

I would like to raise another problem, the borders. This bill gives the Canada Border Services Agency 100 additional officers who would conduct investigations, issue arrest warrants and detain unsuccessful claimants. Naturally, we are not opposed to the idea of increasing the number of officers. However, I find it strange that we are not trying to reassign the members of the RCMP who held these border positions. At every border post, the RCMP used to mafia refugees from crossing into our country. Yes, there are mafia refugees, and where I come from, it is a significant problem.

When the Conservative Party was in opposition, it was in favour of maintaining that force. When it came to power, we thought it wanted to restore it, since it was always against removing it. But no, it has never put it back. Since 2006, this has been a taboo subject that it does not want to talk about.

I think we have to divide these new positions up between border services officers and the RCMP. For the bill as a whole, we are in fact talking about $540 million. It seems to me they could have thought about that, since this is part of the immigration we do not want. We do not want the mafia here. We do not want people who belong to the cartels passing themselves off as refugees. We are in complete agreement, we do not want those people.

Why not hire , as was the case before, RCMP constables, who are well-armed, well-informed and well aware of the situation? I am not saying that the border officers do not do a good job, but to each their own job. One group is prepared to deal with false refugee claimants who belong to organized crime groups, and the other group looks after refugees who also may not be welcome for other reasons, but who are not part of the mafia and who are not known cartel members.

Those two issues in particular should be examined in committee. They are important points because we have to be able to tell the difference. Once again, it benefits our country to grant refugee protection to people who need it. We have to reduce waiting times, we completely agree. In my riding, there are people who have suffered unspeakable things. They waited 19 or 20 or 22 months before getting answers. We have to cut that time, I agree completely. But if they had not waited so long to introduce this bill, the problem might not be so serious.

It is nonetheless a bill that we really want to examine in committee, because its principle is worth considering.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for that point of view.

I am going to put on the record what the Canadian Council for Refugees said. It said that the minister has repeatedly referred to 97% of Hungarian claims being withdrawn or abandoned in 2009, but it said that figure is misleading as most Hungarian claimants were still waiting for a hearing at the end of 2009, 2,422 compared to only 259 who withdrew or abandoned their claim. The council also pointed out that nothing would change for these claimants under refugee reform, nothing.

The council says that currently most claimants who withdraw leave soon after. If they do not, they wait to be called for a PRRA and then wait perhaps six months or more for a decision. The same would happen under Bill C-11.

Much more sensible in the council's view would be to provide an opportunity for reopening at the IRB and if the claimant shows there are good reasons for reinstating the claim, let it go forward before the IRB. If not, the claimant is ready for removal.

This highlights the main problem. The government repeatedly wants to make policy based on extreme examples. It does that all the time. If one pardon comes out for one person, the government changes the pardon system. In the refugee system if there are some bogus claims or false claims from one country, the government will designate that the claims of everybody from that country are suspect at least in terms of the refugee appeal division.

That is not sound policy.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, it gives me a great deal of pleasure to stand and speak about Bill C-11, which if approved, would make important changes to Canada's refugee determination system.

I think everybody agrees that there are problems with the current system and that the goal we all share is to have a system that, both fairly and quickly, determines who needs refugee protection. I also want to say that I do appreciate the minister's hard work and willingness to listen to all sides of this debate, and I want to commend him on that. It typifies his usual approach to making legislation in this country.

Having said that, I do think Bill C-11 has serious flaws that would put refugees, particularly the most vulnerable, at risk of being deported and subject to persecution. I want to highlight some of the key concerns I have with this bill.

The first is the designated countries of origin. This bill would empower the minister to designate countries whose nationals would not have access to a refugee appeal. Although the minister refers publicly to "safe countries of origin", neither the word “safe” nor any criteria are included in Bill C-11. I believe this is unfair and structurally unsound. It would treat claimants differently based on the country of origin, and that is discriminatory.

Refugee determination requires individual assessment of each case, not group judgments. Claimants who would be particularly hurt, for example, include women making gender-based claims and persons claiming on the basis of sexual orientation. In many countries that otherwise may seem peaceful and “safe”, there could be serious problems of persecution on these grounds.

Claimants from designated countries would face a bias against them even at the first level under such a scheme, since decision-makers would be aware of the government's judgment on the country at first instance. Moreover, claims from countries that generally seem not to be refugee-producing are among those that often most need appeal, due to difficult issues of fact and law, such as the availability of state protection.

Finally, denial of fair process to these claimants might lead to their forced return to persecution, once again in violation of human rights law and international covenants of which Canada is a signatory.

Other concerns about this designated country of origin concept is that having a list of safe countries of origin would politicize the refugee system. There is just no doubt about it. If any minister of the crown can make a list of countries that he or she feels are safe, that cannot help but interject a degree of politicization into a judicial process that cannot help but be flawed, unfair and wrong. In addition, there might be new diplomatic pressures from countries that might be unhappy about not being considered safe, and there could be ramifications internationally for Canada's reputation abroad as well.

As currently drafted, this amendment would give the minister a blank cheque to designate any country, part of country or group within a country without reference to the principles of refugee protection. Let me give just a couple of illustrations about this.

I mentioned earlier that Australia has adopted a system similar to this, and just recently it has listed Afghanistan and Sri Lanka as countries it claims are safe, which would bar certain privileges to refugees from those countries making claims.

We have also heard the minister, on repeated occasions, talk about the Roma in Hungary as not having legitimate claims because, in his opinion, Hungary is a safe country. We all know that gypsies and Roma were rounded up along with Jews and communists during World War II and sent to the gas chamber for one reason only, that they were Roma. Historic discrimination persists in central European countries against Roma to this day. Whether or not that amounts of oppression, there is no question about the fact that they experience systematic discrimination. My grandparents were born in Hungary, and I have a fair bit of knowledge about the Hungarian culture and the situation of Roma in that country.

We can tell in advance of this test even being adopted that there would be serious disagreements about what is or is not a safe country.

The eight-day interview and hearing after sixty days is problematic. The government proposes that claimants be interviewed by the Immigration and Refugee Board after eight days and that the hearing take place sixty days later.

This presents procedural and substantive unfairness. Eight days after arrival is often too soon for a formal interview. If the interview were used to take claimants' detailed statements about their claims, it might be unfair to the most vulnerable claimants, such as those traumatized by experiences of torture or women unaccustomed to speaking to authority figures.

I will give a real example. A woman came to Canada with little formal education, unable to speak English or French. At her refugee hearing she was confused by the questions and gave unsatisfactory answers, in the official's opinion. She was found not credible and her claim was denied.

After the hearing, the full story came out. This woman had been gang-raped for three days in police detention in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The experience left her quite understandably traumatized and terrified of people in authority. Her feelings of shame made her reluctant to discuss her experience of sexual violence.

She was able to talk freely about this experience only much later, after her lawyer spent many hours gaining her trust. She had also by then obtained some counselling and had the support of her community. She has now applied for humanitarian and compassionate consideration and is waiting for a decision. This is the kind of situation that can occur when we rush to judgment.

Some claimants are ready for a hearing after 60 days, of course, but others are not, including refugees who need to build that kind of trust and gather the evidence they require. Many refugees need more than 60 days to gather relevant documentation to support their claims, particularly when many are fleeing a newly-emerging pattern of persecution or have come from detention. It is also an inefficient method, because holding a hearing before a claimant is ready, on an arbitrary timeline, could lead to inaccurate and incomplete decisions and the consideration of cases that are not based on the full facts.

Another flawed part of this bill concerns the decision makers. First-instance decision makers under this proposed bill would be civil servants rather than cabinet appointees. Members of the refugee appeal division under this bill would be appointed by cabinet.

There is something positive to this. In the first instance, the proposal would avoid the current problematic political appointments, which are frequently tainted by partisan and political considerations and not made in a timely way. To that extent I think it is a positive.

Why this is wrong and unfair is that assigning refugee determination to civil servants is fundamentally problematic because they lack the necessary independence. Any kind of quasi-judicial process must, as a fundamental question of natural law, include decision makers who are untainted by any political considerations and are truly independent.

Limiting appointments to civil servants would also exclude some of the most highly qualified potential decision makers from a diverse range of backgrounds, such as academia, human rights and social services. This would affect the quality of decision making.

The question of appointments to the RAD remains unresolved. Under this bill, they still would be political appointees, and the problems with that are self-evident.

I want to chat about the appeal and pre-removal risk assessment as well. The refugee appeal division would finally be implemented, and I want to congratulate the minister for that. That is a positive step. Thanks to his persistent work on this, that would help our system. There are some positives because an appeal on the merits is necessary to correct the inevitable errors at the first instance.

The PRRA is inefficient and ineffective at the moment. It makes better sense to look at new evidence at the RAD. In some sense it is inefficient also because the bill leaves in place the highly inefficient PRRA process, which routinely takes months or years for a decision, the average in 2006 being 202 days.

What we all need to do in the House is focus on the essence of refugees and a proper system. Wherever they are in the world, refugees have the same needs. They need protection and a durable solution. Canada has specific legal obligations toward refugees who are in Canada, so it is wrong to suggest that trading off refugees here in favour of refugees abroad is any kind of real answer.

We have a moral responsibility toward refugees elsewhere in the world and here in Canada. We could and should do more to resettle refugees, including addressing the huge delays and low quality of decision making at some visa offices.

I look forward to considering the bill at committee. The minister has expressed that he is open to amendments. I think we can improve the bill and make the kind of refugee system which will serve Canada and refugees from around the world well.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I agree with the member's speech entirely.

We are optimistic that the minister actually has the political smarts to make this bill a success, just from the attitude he has expressed, unlike some of the other ministers in this House.

Fundamentally, though, we do have a serious problem with this safe countries list. The problem is that Bill C-11 creates a refugee claims process that is fast but not necessarily fair. The introduction of the safe countries of origin means the minister has the power to create two classes of refugees, those with the right of appeal and those without the right of appeal.

The other day the minister offered to let us see the regulations before the bill passes. I think it is a positive sign. However, we could see those regulations but a future minister could then change those regulations and we could be back to where we started.

Does the member think that the minister's offer of showing the committee the regulations before the bill is passed is actually an open and progressive way of dealing with this particular issue?

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Madam Speaker, it was in March that the federal government introduced the bill we are discussing today, Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act and called it part of its balanced refugee reform. The minister said that its objective is to preserve the system's integrity by reducing wait times for refugee claims to be processed and, he said, to give people the protection they need more quickly. The bill proposes spending an additional $540.7 million over five years.

The Bloc Québécois will support this bill so that it is referred to committee and an in-depth study can be undertaken of the refugee system, its flaws and the proposed amendments. The Bloc Québécois will work hard to see that all the necessary amendments are passed so that this reform is effective and so that claims are processed quickly and processed fairly, in the case of refugees. Many of the measures in this bill are interesting. And even though they are being proposed as part of the reform of Canada's asylum system, we believe that they are hiding other, more worrying proposals. In our opinion, the bill we are discussing today, Bill C-11, contains fundamental flaws.

What we noticed as we were going through this bill initially was the typically Conservative ideology that seeks to differentiate between genuine and false claimants. We are concerned about that because we believe that reforms based on that kind of discriminatory principle could be deeply prejudicial toward refugees. The bill also gives the minister significant latitude in designing the asylum-granting system. We also noticed that several of the measures announced as part of this reform do not appear in the bill. For example, the minister can designate countries of origin according to criteria set out in regulations published in the Canada Gazette, but the criteria used in creating the list of safe countries cannot be debated in the House. We believe that lacks transparency. The minister is really giving himself a lot of powers.

Several other measures also make us worry about the politicization of the system. First, the minister may designate, by order, a country whose classes of nationals, in the Minister’s opinion, meet the criteria established by the regulations. Second, the minister can designate countries whose nationals are precluded from appealing decisions to the refugee appeal division. Third, the minister can prohibit nationals of certain countries from applying for protection. Fourth, the minister can grant an exemption from any obligations of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act on humanitarian and compassionate grounds or on public policy grounds.

Once again, the minister really would be assuming a lot of powers.

The Bloc Québécois believes that an appeal process for refugee claimants should have been instituted when the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act came into force in June 2002. In fact, the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration unanimously passed a Bloc Québécois motion requiring the federal government to set up a refugee appeal division immediately.

We also introduced Bill C-280 in 2006, which became BIll C-291 in 2009, with the aim of establishing a real refugee appeal division. Unfortunately, the House's two official parties, the Conservatives and the Liberals, joined forces to defeat that bill. Members on both sides either abstained or were absent.

Some members hid behind the curtains, so they would not have to vote.

The Bloc Québécois is delighted that the bill before us could finally establish a refugee appeal division and allow new measures to be added to the system, even though the refugee appeal division will not be up and running until two years after the new Immigration and Refugee Protection Act comes into force.

Also, unsuccessful claimants from countries that are deemed safe will have no right to appeal the initial decision rendered by public servants. We believe this measure is far too strict. It is unfair that claimants from a safe country whose first application is denied cannot appeal their cases before the refugee appeal division, and instead must take their cases to Federal Court.

Earlier I spoke about designated countries of origin. I spoke about designated countries and other countries. The United Kingdom uses a fast tracking process to examine refugee claims from designated countries. Canada, on the other hand, would assess all claims from all countries the same way. The only reason the process would be any faster is that unsuccessful claimants from countries that are deemed safe will have no right to appeal their case before the new refugee appeal division. We think this measure is discriminatory.

The principle of safe countries raises a number of other concerns. First, the fact that a refugee can be classified as a false claimant even before his or her case is analyzed can be extremely prejudicial. Even though the government assures us that all claims will be analyzed on their own merits, it cannot guarantee that no mistakes will be made in first-level decisions. For this reason in particular, the committee must look at this issue and consider how such a designation by the minister could affect refugee claimants.

The Bloc Québécois had made it known that it wanted all failed refugee claimants to have access to the refugee appeal division, regardless of their country of origin. Our critic on the committee is willing to look at any measures that would correct this flaw, such as including criteria for designating safe countries in the bill. As things now stand, these criteria would be established by regulation.

Canada's asylum system has always been based on reliable, solid resources that make for sound decisions. The proposal to submit all the necessary documents within eight days and hold hearings within 60 days after the claim is made could mean a change in this procedure and could have serious consequences for refugees. With such short deadlines, decision-makers could make decisions too quickly, and the quality of the decisions would suffer as a result.

Refugees have the right to find a lawyer and assemble all the documents they need for their testimony. This is a fundamental rule of justice.

I want to make one last point. The fact that IRB officials make the first-level decisions is problematic. These officials are probably long-standing employees, but it is essential that they demonstrate a certain level of independence.

Lastly, Bill C-11 must be studied in committee, because it has major flaws. That is why it will be sent to committee. I am sure that our critic on the committee will clearly state the Bloc's position.

[Mario Silva, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Madam Speaker, history calls out to us across the years as parliamentarians to consider immigration and refugee policy with responsibility, fairness and compassion. We are a great nation which has much to be proud of, but our history in this area often fell short of our ideals and values as a people. That is why the bill before us today requires our close attention and responsible deliberation.

The bill we debate today, Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, is such a bill. The very name indicates that the changes proposed are significant, as they reach from the administrative process of reviewing refugee applications to the court system itself.

I believe fundamentally that the measure of a country can often be reflected in the manner in which it deals with those who seek refuge on its shores. As parliamentarians we are reminded that there were times in our history when our approach to those seeking refuge was misguided and wrong.

As the current chair of the inquiry panel on the Canadian Parliamentarian Coalition to Combat Antisemitism, I am fully aware of this reality. Despite the terrible events that were taking place in Europe in the 1930s, Canada, along with many other nations, repeatedly refused Jewish refugees seeking sanctuary here. The reality of what happened to the refugee ship, the SS St. Louis, is a concrete example of the sad effects of such a policy. In 1939, with 907 Jewish refugees aboard, this ship was denied landing in Cuba, the United States and Canada, leaving those aboard no option other than to return to their terrible fate in Nazi Germany.

Likewise, the Komagata Maru incident demonstrated discriminatory views once held against Asians. In 1914, 354 Indian passengers were denied entry to Canada, and the ship on which they sailed, the Komagata Maru, was forced to return to India, and upon arrival, a number of the passengers were killed in clashes with police.

We also note the difficulties experienced by Sikhs looking to come to Canada. Despite being recognized as loyal citizens of the then British Empire, in 1907, Canada actually banned Sikh immigration to this country.

Perhaps the most well-known policy of discrimination in Canada dealt with Chinese immigrants. Those building our national railway brought thousands of Chinese people to Canada to construct this project, simply to reduce their labour costs. When the railway was finished, the government of the day passed the Chinese Immigration Act of 1885, which imposed a $50 head tax on Chinese immigrants. Remarkably, this law was replaced in 1923 with an outright ban on Chinese immigration, known as the Chinese Immigration Act. This law remained in the books until 1947.

There are, of course, more examples of these kinds of policies in the history of immigration laws in Canada. The point in presenting these examples is to emphasize the need to always ensure that changes to our immigration laws are not only designed to protect Canada's best interests but that they are also fair, just and impartial.

The bill before the House poses to streamline the application process by reducing the timelines for processing to eight days for a first meeting, and 60 days for the first level decision being made by a public servant. With the current processing time extending up to 18 months, clearly there is a need for change. However, is eight days a reasonable proposal? Can potential refugees be dealt with fairly in the eight day window, and can a sound decision be made within the proposed 60 day timeframe? Do these deadlines allow refugee claimants adequate time to seek legal counsel and prepare for their meetings with immigration officials?

Many stakeholder groups have expressed concern that these proposed timeframes are simply too tight for fair adjudication of refugee claims. I believe it is essential that these concerns in regard to the timelines be fully considered and addressed at the forthcoming committee hearings.

In terms of decision-making itself, we have only to look at some of the serious concerns that have been raised in the United Kingdom, where the system is similar to what is being proposed here. This is especially relevant in terms of a decision-making process that will allow a public servant considerable power to make decisions with regard to a refugee application. It is essential that such individuals be well-trained and prepared to make such important decisions.

A prima facie review of the bill's appeal provisions seems to provide a more efficient process for denied refugee claimants to appeal. However, there are also serious concerns. The bill would not allow for an appeal under humanitarian and compassionate grounds or a pre-removal risk assessment for a full year after a denial. Many applicants would likely be gone from Canada before this one year deadline arrived.

Similarly, the use of a safe country list that prohibits appeals from those who are deemed to have come to Canada from safe countries is troublesome. Such a list would appear to violate article 3 of the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, which reads:

The Contracting States shall apply the provisions of this Convention to refugees without discrimination as to race, religion or country of origin.

Stakeholders have also expressed concerns about who would be responsible for the creation of a safe country list and also, of course, about possible political and diplomatic pressure that would be associated with such a list. By way of example, such a safe country list would clearly be problematic in relation to the issue of war resisters from the United States.

Most of us acknowledge the need for changes to our refugee determination process. The issue is not the need for change but the form this change will take. I am hopeful that the issues I have raised here today will be effectively addressed with further consideration of this bill.

Finally, we must remember that it is important to acknowledge that throughout our history refugees are among those who have contributed the most to our country's vitality and prosperity. This alone is a profound reason to ensure that the changes being considered are fair and just. In this context, I borrow from the words of former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan, when he stated:

I urge you to celebrate the extraordinary courage and contributions of refugees past and present.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, eight minutes of course will not be enough to deal with the issue of immigration reform in Canada, which is long overdue, but I will do my best. I thank you for another wise ruling from the chairs the previous night.

Bill C-11 speaks, very importantly, to the nature and essence of reform of the immigration and refugee laws in Canada, particularly around refugee claimants.

The New Democrats have a number of concerns with the fundamentals that have been placed before us. We sought to move the bill to the committee before it had received the recommendation of the House in principle so that we could more fundamentally get at some of those problems. We recognize where the House is at right now and we will be seeking to improve the bill once it gets to committee. I want to focus in on couple of items today that are most critical to the plight of refugees and the treatment they receive when they come to Canada.

When dealing with the issue of immigration or dealing with refugees, it brings out both the best and worst in a country and in the politics that exist, and the attempt by any government to weave politics into a refugee system is one that must be resisted and avoided at all times. The temptation is there because we have well established communities within Canada that have various views on immigration policy and they will attempt to push certain angles and representations of those views on to any sitting government of the day.

What must be resisted is that these reforms do not last just through the next election cycle or the one beyond that, but can last for many years. There has been an unfortunate series of events over the last 100 to 150 years in this country where immigration and refugee claimant rules have been used to, in a sense, abuse certain groups coming from certain regions of the world that we just did not like at the time for political reasons.

The list has been well enunciated. The government is well aware of past claims and misdeeds by previous governments. Apologies have been issued. A bill was passed in the House just last night dealing with the treatment of Italian Canadians during the second world war. We have seen the error of our ways in the past and we must not be doomed to repeat them again.

Of particular concern in the bill right now is the list of safe countries. For those following the bill, they will be aware that the government has proposed this idea that there will be an ongoing list of countries that will be deemed to have one status and another list of countries that will be deemed to be less favourable for whatever domestic issues are going on in those countries at the time.This is unfortunate in a way because it applies methodology that may, in some circumstances, not work because all countries within themselves do not have uniform circumstances. A refugee claimant coming from one part of the Sudan will have a very different claim than one coming from another region. Someone coming from one part of Chile at a certain time will look very different from someone coming from another part, and the list goes on.

The concern we have, in looking through Bill C-11, is that not only is the list not provided of what countries the government will sanction and those that it will punish, but we are still looking for the criteria that will be used by the government to establish those lists. This is fundamental. It is very difficult for any member in this place to vote on legislation that will designate countries one way or another if we do not have the criteria and the rules before us. This is more than unfortunate. This is a trust me attitude from the government that is not acceptable. We need to clarify this. We need to nail it down.

I had brief conversations with the minister about the number of refugee claimants that will be permitted. We are looking forward to understanding that Canada will remain and enhance its accessibility to refugee claimants who come from abroad. We have a story about ourselves in Canada, that we are an open and forgiving place that will allow folks to come from all sorts of different situations, some of them very difficult, such as when a country is in crisis or when a particular group of citizens in a country is being targeted. Whether for their political beliefs, their gender, their sexual orientation or whatnot, we believe ourselves to be a welcoming place, a place that does not pass such judgments as is seen in other countries, particularly when there is great political upheaval, which we are seeing on the evening news almost every night.

However, we need an understanding of how we will judge a country and whether we will have the ability to specify regions within a country in which particular political persecution is going on.

I worked in Africa for a time and we would see at the state level of a certain government that a governor of that state would pass some atrocious decree thereby subjecting a whole group of its citizens to unfair treatment, persecution and sometimes death. This, unfortunately, was too common. We do not know if Bill C-11, this refugee reform, will have the dexterity to deal with situations like that.

We have also seen just recently, through our neighbours to the south, draconian laws being passed in Arizona where it legislated racial profiling for people coming from Mexico or looking like they may have come from Mexico. It is politics at its worst when we see a state deciding to racially profile a whole group of people and subject them to laws that no one else in society is subjected to simply because of the colour of their skin. One would hope that we had moved or devolved beyond this in the western world, but politics being what it is at times, folks playing for a few more votes will introduce bills like this. Properly, however, the President of the United States has condemned what the government at that state level is doing.

I only raise that example, not to cast aspersions on the government here in Canada, but to say that on this issue, if not more than any other, the temptation to play into some momentary passing political interest that is appealing to one interest or another, be it pro-immigration or anti-immigration, we have seen for far too long. I am the son of an immigrant family and there was wave after wave of immigrants coming into this country. One would assume that the wave that had just preceded the new wave of immigrants would be more sympathetic to the ones just coming but, unfortunately, there is some element of human nature that does not lend itself always that way. My family coming from Ireland may have had better treatment than others but not necessarily. The racial stereotypes and the mistreatment, not just of folks who are coming but their descendants, is consistent. I grew up in a city that was a multicultural as any in the world and yet still had this underlying tone.

That is something that the government, while it cannot appease entirely, must work through bills, like Bill C-11, to alleviate to their maximum possibility. If we are to be a welcoming and generous country and a country that continues to have a history of being proud of our immigrant population and encourage more to come, we must make the best reforms possible for refugee and immigration claimants. We must remove the politics as much as possible and allow the country to be as free, open and accessible as possible.

We are for a faster immigration system but we will not sacrifice the fairness aspect. We will not simply say that folks have eight days, cannot seek legal representation and that is it, and they are back out again, because that makes them potentially victims of these so-called immigration consultants that seem to pop up.

I hope we can get this right because it is critical that we do.

The House resumed from April 27 consideration of the motion that Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with some pleasure that I enter this debate.

I am a member from the rural parts of our country in northwestern British Columbia. Issues around refugee and immigration reform in general touch us as much in rural Canada as they do in other parts of the country. This is perhaps an untold story, that my staff and my communities are constantly dealing with questions that we facing here in the House.

I would also like to thank the member for Trinity—Spadina for her tireless work on this issue over the years, both bringing in personal sentiment and cause, and a calm rationality to try to reform the system that we all in this place can recognize is broken.

I think it is high time that Canadians come to understand where the true fixes lay, where the true solutions are to be had, and that governments resist the temptation that they have so often given in to, to politicize the refugee and immigration system in this country. Whether it is pandering to votes on one side of the conversation or to another, while it is trying to make some appeal to a particular group of new Canadians or make an appeal to some reactionary elements in our country that are fundamentally anti-immigrant.

We have to recognize that those forces are in play in this country and they come to bear on any government and any elected member. We have to resist those for a longer vision, a more noble and honest opinion of where Canada needs to be, not just in the next year or the next 10 years but in the next 100 years.

Decisions that we make with respect to bills like this have an effect for many years to come on those individuals and families seeking to reunite, seeking to find a better life here in Canada. We are also trying to find ways to keep folks from clogging up the system, entering the system knowingly, and trying to corrupt the system.

It is unfortunate but rules in this place are so often made for the minority. Rules are so often made for the cases of people trying to put the system into jeopardy but end up hurting so many of the vast majority who are simply trying to appeal to Canada's ethics and morality on a refugee claimant basis. They are coming from a country of some hardship and in particular circumstances, where they are being biased against for who they are, either their gender or their sexual orientation, and their economic status or political affiliations.

These are difficult questions for a refugee board to sort out. These are obviously difficult questions for a government to sort out.

No one, and certainly not New Democrats, lauds previous Liberal governments for their inaction on the backlogs that were created year in and year out. Justice delayed is justice denied. It was too often that people were cast into a system with no end in sight. This was not a decent way to deal with refugees and immigrants to this country. This was not a decent way or a humanitarian way to deal with folks.

We also see, with the current government's either action or lack of action in some cases, a contribution to the problem that we saw when the current government was elected in 2006. There was a reluctance to appoint new people to the boards.

The system is inherently political and partisan. This is something that we hope to reform. We actually had some glimmer of hope from the government when it sought to have an appointments commissioner, someone who would act in a non-partisan way to review the many hundreds and in some cases thousands of appointments in a year, that did not have any partisan connection, that could create a stand-alone committee at arm's length from the government.

New Democrats worked with the current government to make this happen and make it a reality. Unfortunately, the government's first choice for who should lead that commission was a gentleman who was the chief fundraiser for the Prime Minister, who had helped the Prime Minister achieve office.

Colleagues across the aisle are shaking their heads, but it is fact and case in point. When New Democrats asked if there was anybody else out there who could help with the appointment process other than this one individual most closely tied to the sitting Prime Minister, the government scrapped the whole idea. It said this was the only individual out of some 30-some odd million Canadians who was sufficiently capable of heading up an appointments process, and if we would not accept him it was going to get rid of the whole idea.

We thought it was a good idea. It was a good idea. The members can heckle all they want, but what they cannot deny is the fact that the Prime Minister put one single name forward and that was it, take it or leave it. We actually notice that time and time this has become this Prime Minister's tendency, his habit, to lean toward this type of leadership. It was rebuked earlier today from the Chair itself, this kind of intolerant approach.

Now we head to this issue of Bill C-11. My colleague from Trinity—Spadina made the good point that we sought to move this bill to committee prior to second reading. That would allow the committee even more latitude to make more fundamental changes to the bill. The government refused that.

We will work within the parameters of this place in a democratic way to effect this bill for the betterment of all those seeking refugee status in Canada.

It must be noted that when dealing with immigration and refugee issues, it brings out both the best and worst in a country. Our history has proven that out. In this place, the Prime Minister and various parties over the years have had to stand and publicly apologize for the treatment of people from different countries appealing to Canada's conscience to allow them to come to this country.

Some years ago, Jewish immigrants, Indians from the Komagata Maru and Irish immigrants were rejected simply based on narrow stereotypes of the worst order of that time. We evolve, move on, mature as a country, gain competence, and realize that we were wrong, that we used the barriers to our country as a tool or mechanism to punish those we were fearful of, those we did not like or suspected. This is the worst element of the refugee and immigration system and it is a difficult thing to get right.

We have no pretensions in the New Democratic Party that this is an easy thing to do, properly, fair and balanced, but today as we seek to speed up the process, we also look for a fair process. We look for one that does not sacrifice fairness for expediency, that does not create more errors that future prime ministers and governments will have to stand up and apologize for. This is something we all wish to resist and we should resist in every way as we look through this bill.

It is also a crisis in the making as the government refused, in the political appointment process, to put Liberals back on the board because it did not like Liberals and it did not want to give them a job, basically. I do not know if it did not like some of their decisions or it simply did not want Liberals on the government dime any more, but rather than replacing them with skilled and qualified Canadians to fill those roles, the backlog grew again.

When we have these crises, these moments that occur and require severe action, we have to pay attention to whether they were at all manufactured. If they were, then the cynical minds within this place will say it was done intentionally to move some radical reforms. If we create the crisis, we need to meet it with some expeditious force that will change it all dramatically.

It is also a story about the best of Canada, the best that we wish to be, and how we wish to present ourselves to the world as a safe haven for refugees, as a place people can come when they are being mistreated, and subjected to torture in all sorts of inhumane conditions. Canada must be a beacon of light in the world that people feel they can come to, where they can make an appeal to the Canadian system that is a full and transparent process.

This is the question we have on the expediency of this particular bill, the eight-day condition. Will refugees be able to seek the kind of legal support in order to defend themselves in front of the board or will they get one of these so-called consultants? We need to find another word for these immigration consultants.

I, like many members of Parliament, have had these folks on my doorstep. I am sure the immigration minister has met with some of them, bottom feeders I think the minister sometimes refers to them. These folks are sometimes in training and sometimes have noble intention, but too often pariahs on the system, pariahs on people's fear and desperate need to get into this country, and they offer them bad advice.

I worked in Sierra Leone for a while before entering politics and had the unbelievable frustration of meeting a young Sierra Leone man who had been engaged in the civil war and had his entire family wiped out by the rebels. He was appealing to Canada and had, through his church, forked over $850, which is an enormous sum to someone living in Sierra Leone, to one of these consultants. What did that Canadian consultant do? He provided that young man with a form that was available on a website.

These consultants prey upon refugees' fear and ignorance, that those seeking to come here think that this is an impossible system to get through. These people do not live in a democratic society where there are forms available for anything. This is a wartorn country and these consultants are preying upon these refugees, folks who often have already gone through hell and back, and are now seeking a better life in Canada. These immigration consultants pop up, promising the world, and charging even more for these folks to access Canada.

It seems to me we also need more refugee protection officers in the system. This is something the bill does not sufficiently seem to answer at this point.

We are caring communities in Canada. I represent northwestern British Columbia. Whenever there is a global crisis, whether it is Haiti or any other place, it is amazing to me that within days emails are in my inbox, I receive phone calls and people stop me on the street, either through faith-based organizations, their communities or themselves as families, saying they want to help, they want to offer access and safe refuge to people who have gone through such trauma.

As elected members, it is very rewarding when we meet those Canadians who are willing to open up their homes and sacrifice financially to welcome people in from another place and offer them a bit of the life that we have here, something that some of us were born with.

I am the first-born of an immigrant family and some of the things that concern me about the immigration reform before me is that I have to cast through and wonder whether my family would have made it through the system. Would my family of Irish farmers been able to apply under the immigration standards that the government currently holds? My family is a proud family but they were not rich. They did not have access or influence. They would simply have applied on the basis of their hard work, integrity and merit and spent the last 40 years helping build this country, as so many immigrants before them have. That is a test that I hold and a test that I hope we all hold, which is thinking back through our own lineages, our own coming here if we were not born here as first nations and for many generations past. I hope we give this bill a--

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to this debate on Bill C-11. I know we are not supposed to do this, but I would like to thank the minister for being here in the House to listen to the debates. I think it is important for the minister to hear these debates in the House, because many people are affected and often experience human tragedies with the immigration and refugee system in Canada.

I am in a good position to talk about this, because I represent the riding of Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, one of those urban ridings that struggles with these human tragedies every day. I have a been a member in this House for 13 years, and 80% of my interactions with constituents are related to problems with immigration and refugee claims.

Members can imagine the kind of pressure our staff is under as they deal with these situations every day. I would like to take this opportunity to mention some of my constituents and staff from my riding. I am thinking of Louise Bellemare, at my constituency office, and Michel Blouin and René Champagne, who work hard every day to help constituents who are struggling to understand the system.

I used the word “understand” because few people truly understand the mechanisms and workings of the Canadian system because it is complex and because—we must not forget—the government has added to that complexity in recent years. Each year 25,000 people seek asylum in Canada. That is roughly equal to the backlog. That is a serious problem. Quite often, when someone seeking refugee status arrives in Canada, it takes nearly 28 days for them to meet with a government official to explain their situation.

It generally takes close to 19 months to have a hearing with the Immigration and Refugee Board, the IRB. During these 19 months, the person belongs to a community; they share common values, have conversations and slowly integrate themselves. Those 19 months are filled with insecurity. And 19 months later they get a hearing with the IRB. But only 45% of these claimants will actually get refugee status at the end of the IRB process. And so, 55% of the claimants are denied by the IRB.

The individual can then start the process of asking the Federal Court for a judicial review. But only 13% of such cases will be heard by the Federal Court. That is truly unfair because very few of these people will have their cases heard by the Federal Court.

Even if they are not heard there, they can always apply for a pre-removal risk assessment, a PRRA, but again, there is roughly a three-year waiting period. Everyone knows that at this stage of the process, the chance of getting a positive ruling is roughly 2%.

The chances are very low. Despite this refusal, the person has not reached the end of the road because he can still go to the Federal Court and request a review of the PRRA ruling. During this process, nothing is stopping the person from applying for permanent resident status on humanitarian grounds. The entire process takes approximately four to six years.

Very few people in Canada really know the process, but many people are in this situation. I am thinking of Ms. Camara, among others, who arrived here in 2006 and waited 10 months for a hearing with the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. Some may say that she is lucky since the average wait for a hearing is 19 months and she waited nine months less than the average to get a hearing.

We are in this situation because, between 2006 and 2009, the government and the minister refused to appoint any so-called new decision makers. There were only 50 decision makers out of a possible 164. That is what has caused the backlog. The backlog grew from 20,000 claims in 2005 to 60,000 claims in 2009. The government created these delays despite the harm done to persons seeking status under Canada's Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

Introduced on March 30, 2010, this bill seeks to reduce processing times and to provide $540 million over five years. This money will not go directly to help settle refugees but will be allocated for the most part to border officers. Thus, there will be more investigations and screening. These changes are designed to increase the restrictions on people who wish to be recognized under Canada's Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

There must be no misunderstanding. We are not opposed to some of the government's proposals because we recognize that waiting times must be shortened. We must ensure that decisions are made as quickly as possible.

I remember that when I arrived in the House in 1997 it took approximately six to eight months, on average, to obtain a first hearing at the Immigration and Refugee Board. It now takes 19 months. This is a real problem that leads to human tragedies, as I was saying, and also creates interminable procedures: application for refugee status, federal court proceedings, PRRA, applications for permanent residence on humanitarian grounds, and I have surely forgotten others.

Reform is necessary. We support part of this reform. As members know, we would have preferred that this bill be sent directly to committee, but that was not possible. Therefore, we are starting this process today in the hope that, at the committee stage, we will be able to study the changes we are seeking more thoroughly.

We are pleased to see the creation of the refugee appeal division in the bill before us today, because we have been asking for it for a long time, since 2001 in fact. I remind members that we have been working on this bill since 2001 and that the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act included the possibility of the government actually establishing this appeal division.

I remember the Liberals telling us that they would reduce the number of board members hearing refugee claims from two to one. At the same time, they promised to establish this appeal division.

The Liberals did not keep their word. We gave them the chance to make up for it when we introduced Bill C-291 in the House. This bill proposed the creation of the refugee appeal division. It was passed at second reading, but was defeated by one vote at third reading.

We must remember that when the time came to create this appeal division at third reading, the Liberals were nowhere to be found in the House. I will not name them because I know that it is unparliamentary to mention colleagues who are absent from the House, but there were 12 of them missing. We know who they were; we took note and we will remember them during the next election campaign. These 12 Liberals prevented us from implementing a real appeal division, as we have been proposing since 2001.

This proposal was defeated, but an appeal division is still necessary, because mistakes can be made in our legal system. Citizens must be able to appeal a decision, whether it is from a quasi-judicial tribunal or a court of justice. When the Liberals proposed the refugee appeal division in 2001, they proposed having one member make decisions instead of two. There could have been arbitrary decisions. The proof is that some IRB members reject 98% of refugee claims. So even among the members' decisions, there does not appear to be balance.

I am not here to question IRB member decisions. I know that it is a quasi-judicial tribunal, and I do not plan on looking at each and every one of these decisions. However, there does not seem to be balance among the decisions of some judges.

The decisions can sometimes be arbitrary and things should be more fair. That is why the government has created the refugee appeal division. However, the problem is that not everyone can take advantage of it. I cannot emphasize enough that there will be exceptions. Anyone coming from countries designated as safe would not be able to appeal the decisions made by government officials acting as decision makers—not board members—who have been given more power. I will say more about that later. This appeal division would not be available to everyone.

We, on this side of the House, would like to know what is meant by safe country. The government is telling us that the criteria for designating safe countries will be set by regulation a little later on. But we do not know what the regulations will be. The government is asking for a blank cheque and our trust. Citizens who do not come from a safe country will be able to appeal, but those who come from a safe country will not. But what is a safe country? We do not know. According to the government in one of its balanced refugee reform documents:

Safe countries of origin would include countries that do not normally produce refugees, have a robust human rights record and offer strong state protection.

That is the government's definition, but at the same time, it is saying that the criteria will be set out later in regulations. The government is most likely looking at three countries: Mexico, Hungary and the Czech Republic. Naturally, it will not say anything today because everything will be set out later in regulations.

The government wants us to trust it and says that the process will be balanced and fair. I understand the government will leave it to an advisory committee. However, in the name of transparency, it would have been better to have these regulations.

I have a suggestion for the minister. If he really wants to consult the opposition, I invite him to submit these regulations to the parliamentary committee when the time comes to study the criteria used to determine whether a country is safe.

This bill considerably reduces the role of judges and increases that of public servants, particularly concerning the initial refugee claim. We have never criticized the role of board members. We have always felt that they are appointed based on partisan ideology, but we have never questioned their work. We must seriously consider the fact that public servants will become the decision makers. This is a new approach. I understand that the government wants to ease the workload of judges and leave it up to the public service to assess claims, but this needs to be clarified. I am sure my colleague, the immigration critic, will have many questions in that regard.

This is where things get a little more complicated. The government wants to reduce wait times for interviews. Under the current act, once a person claims refugee status, the average wait time for an initial interview with a government official is about 28 days. Now the minister is saying that will go down to eight days.

As I said earlier, wait times must be reduced. However, we have to look at which wait times to reduce and how to balance the procedures.

We have to remember that, in many cases, people from other countries who arrive in Canada have issues. We need to make sure that an eight-day timeline is not too short. People who claim refugee status have experienced personal traumas. Might the eight-day timeline result in certain injustices and put those people in uncomfortable situations? We will have to look at that.

I would also like to talk about hearings. The government wants to reduce wait times for hearings from 19 months to 60 days. In other words, after the first interview, the government official would schedule a hearing within 60 days. That is not much time for people from countries with unstable governments. People have to submit documentation, and it takes time to send correspondence and receive the required documents. It is important to consider this because if the case goes to the appeal division, all of these processes will be taken into account.

We are in favour of reforming the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, and we believe that wait times should be reduced. In my opinion, hearings should be held sooner following a claimant's arrival because a 19-month wait does not make sense and has made things very difficult for people in the past. We have to make some adjustments. I believe that my colleague, the immigration critic, will invite witnesses to appear before the committee so that we can achieve balanced reforms for people seeking asylum in Canada.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the character of a nation is often defined by how we treat people in desperate situations who come to our shores seeking asylum, safe haven or a better life.

Canada has two sides. One is very generous. If we look at the situation at the turn of the last century, tens of thousands of Irish immigrant refugees fleeing the potato famine arrived at the shores of Canada. Some came to Toronto. At that time the city of York only had 20,000 to 30,000 people, and yet 50,000 Irish refugees came to its shores.

At that time many of them were sick. The people of the city of York could have said they were not welcome, that they were afraid of their diseases and that they should go home, and then could have sent them away. Instead the medical officer of health and many of the residents in the city of York opened up their doors, were very generous and helped to treat them, even to the extent that one of the Protestant medical officers of health died of the disease.

However, there is another side and face to Canada's immigration policy. We can remember many Jewish refugees who tried to come to Canada and were sent away. At that time there were two successive immigration ministers who basically did not want to welcome them. We sent them home. We refused them entry.

At the end of that period, only 5,000 of them came to Canada. We know that had we opened up our doors during that period, many more thousands or tens of thousands of lives could have been saved. They could have found homes and started their families in Canada. That was a dark page of Canadian history.

Much later, in the 1960s, we sent Indians back on the Komagata Maru, some to their death. Again, that period was not a proud time in the history of immigration policy in Canada.

As we go into this debate on this refugee reform bill, Bill C-11, perhaps what we should do is remember that history and that reputation for generosity and for sharing what we have, versus a government that was obsessed with narrow national self-interest. At that time there was also an obsession with elections. We could see these people coming to our shores, either as people seeking new opportunities or as queue-jumpers or people who wanted to scam our system. That is a different way of seeing people who come to Canada.

We know that how we treat these refugees sometimes determines their life or death. If we send them back, sometimes they go to prison or end up being tortured. Some endure beatings or starvation, so in many ways we have to be very cautious.

We have seen examples. A young Mexican woman came to Canada twice, trying to leave the drug lords in Mexico. She was refused refugee status. After the second time she returned to Mexico, she was kidnapped by the people she was originally trying to run away from, and in June 2009 she was found dead with a bullet in her head. How we treat refugees really does sometimes mean life and death.

As a principle of a fast and fair refugee determination, what we want to see is high-quality initial decisions. Get it right the first time.

Let us make sure we keep it non-political and have an independent body make all the decisions. Let us keep the laws simple and not have unnecessary rules or a complicated process. We should also make sure we have the necessary resources in place so that we can avoid backlogs. We should always remember that human lives are at stake and adhere to human rights standards.

As New Democrats, we have long proposed a fast and fair refugee determination process. We have said that all appointments of Immigration and Refugee Board members should be done through an independent appointment commissioner with set criteria.

Right now members are picked by their merits. However, if the minister has 10 names in front of him, he can pick person A versus person B. Persons A and B are both supposed to be qualified, but perhaps person A happens to be a failed Conservative political candidate or someone who donated money. That person could be picked over person B, who happens to have no political background whatsoever. It is very important that an independent appointment commissioner be set up through the Federal Accountability Act, Bill C-2, which was passed in 2006. Those kinds of appointments should be done through an arm's-length commissioner.

Number two, New Democrats have said that we need to hire more permanent refugee protection officers to clear the backlog. That is a no-brainer. If there is a backlog, hire more officers to clear the backlog.

Number three, make sure there is legislation so that the unscrupulous immigration consultants who are telling people how to lie cannot practise. We need to crack down on them, ban them, punish them and throw them in jail. We need to ensure that we ban them from the Immigration and Refugee Board hearing room so that these unscrupulous middle people cannot coach refugees on how to lie.

On the flip side, we must provide legal aid for proper representation. Refugees often come to Canada penniless. Whether they are Jewish, Irish or Indian refugees, when they come to Canada they often do not have money for a court system, so we must provide legal aid to some of the most desperate people.

Number four, we have also said that we must set up a refugee appeal division so that consistent decisions would be made based on law and fact. In fact Parliament mandated such an appeal division in 2001, and successive former Liberal governments chose to ignore it.

Since 2006, the new Conservative government could have implemented all of these recommendations, but through the years it emptied out the refugee board. When it came to power, it did not want to reappoint the Liberal cronies to the Immigration and Refugee Board, so the minister at that time became paralyzed by uncertainty and took no action. He stopped most of the appointments and left the board mostly vacant. The number of refugees waiting their turn for the board to decide their fate grew larger by the day because there was no one around to make the decision.

Critics watched the situation, grew alarmed and said this was going to be disastrous. Even the Auditor General said in one of her reports that the whole system was collapsing and that the government should do something, because it was taking far too long to appoint and train people and it was costly. Against this backdrop, two years later the board is now full, but the minister is now trying to address a crisis that was created partially by his own party.

Bill C-11, the refugee reform act, has a few merits.

One, the process is speedy. Yes, the refugees want to be united with their loved ones, so refugees who come to our shores want us to make fast decisions so that they can bring some of their children and their loved ones who are in refugee camps or urban slums in poor countries to Canada and be united with them. Speed is good.

Two, the bill establishes an appeal process for some refugee claimants. That also is good.

Three, it provides more funding to the Immigration and Refugee Board to clear the backlog. However, we would prefer to see much of the funding go to the Immigration and Refugee Board and the protection officers instead of most of it going to the CBSA, the Canada Border Service Agency and to the Department of Justice to appoint more Federal Court judges. We would prefer to see more refugee claimants as each year's target. We do not believe 9,000 is an adequate number. In 2005 there were 25,000 refugee claimants that were approved in Canada, inland applications were approved.

There is one more aspect in the bill that is good, an assisted voluntary return program, so failed and destitute refugee claimants can get a little help to return to their homeland.

However, this Conservative refugee reform bill has serious flaws.

Problem number one is the safe countries list. The introduction of safe country of origin means the minister has the power to create two classes of refugees: those who have the right to appeal and those who do not have that right.

Claimants who would be particularly hurt would include women making gender-based claims, for example, the one that was raised in the House today. Mrs. Sow was beaten by her second husband. She found a safe haven in Canada, but her case was denied.

Claimants who are most hurt in the safe countries designation would also include people claiming refugee status on the basis of sexual orientation or sexual identity. In many countries that otherwise seem fair and peaceful, there can be serious problems of persecution based on gender or sexual orientation. In 50 years of studying human rights, the international community has learned that there is no country that can easily be declared safe. That is why fundamentally this is a serious flaw in the bill.

Problem number two is that the first hearing is not done by people with any independence of the department or the minister. Bill C-11 sacrifices fairness in the hearing of refugees' claims and centralizes the power in the department and the minister. That is a substantial problem because it really should be an arm's-length group of people who make the first decision. We have seen countries on the safe countries list that have a huge number of appeals and do not allow those appeals to be successful. Making a right decision at the beginning is critically important, and having the first hearing done by officers is not the proper way to do it.

Problem number three is that if those refugees come from safe countries and have no right to appeal, most likely they will not have access to the pre-removal risk assessment within the first year because they are likely to be deported within one year. The problem with the pre-removal risk assessment, even if they do have access, is it takes a long time. Normally it takes close to two years to get a pre-removal risk assessment decision, which means that claimants could be deported before the hearings are done. That is a problem for claimants who are from so-called safe countries.

For example, Ghana is seen as a safe country. In Ghana if a person is gay or lesbian, the person will be punished and thrown into jail because it is illegal to be identified as gay or lesbian.

There are also countries that support female genital mutilation. There are other countries that are supposed to be safe that have a huge number of human rights violations.

Therefore, having a safe country list is not a good way to go.

Furthermore, even though the minister promised many times that there would be action, Bill C-11 does not address the problem of unscrupulous immigration consultants. When we speed up the timelines and get to the first hearing very quickly, it drives many refugee claimants to these so-called immigration consultants who are not licensed and are not qualified. Why? Because a person cannot get legal aid within eight days.

When a person has a hearing within eight days and tries to get legal aid, say in Ontario, the person cannot get legal aid that quickly. We asked some of the people who came to my office why they did not try to retain someone who knows the immigration and refugee law. They said that it takes a long time to get legal aid. Some refugees do not have the funding to do so. It would probably drive more claimants to unscrupulous consultants.

What should we do at this point? My preference was that the bill be sent to the immigration committee before second reading so that there could be amendments. The minister did not agree to that, even though that was the route I preferred to take.

Since that is the case, the bill will go to the citizenship and immigration committee after second reading. At committee we should carefully examine the bill. We must make some amendments as I have suggested to slow down some of the initial processes, to change some of the regulations, to remove the safe countries designation. We must hear from some of the people who have many years of experience dealing with refugees, such as people from the Canadian Council of Refugees, Amnesty International, the Canadian Bar Association, and some of the refugee organizations. Those are the organizations that we must listen to very carefully in order to make the right decisions.

I hope the minister and his government will allow some fundamental amendments at the immigration committee.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I am sure the hon. member for Vancouver East knows that when the whole morning is expended on that, we go straight to government orders after question period. We are now in government orders discussing Bill C-11. We will have to wait for petitions and answers to questions tomorrow, difficult as that may be.

Resuming debate with the hon. member for Parkdale—High Park.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, could you clarify why we are not returning to routine proceedings? We were at motions, but we had not yet gotten to petitions. Are we to go back to petitions before we go back to Bill C-11?

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I was calling for debate. We are ready to start a new speech on Bill C-11.

The House resumed from April 26 consideration of the motion that Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am looking forward to providing some brief comments on this bill, but I will be sharing my time with my colleague, the member for Sault Ste. Marie. I look forward to hearing his comments, which I know will be very cogent and critical to this debate.

I have to say at the very outset that one of the things that troubles me most about this bill is the title, the popular title as I may put it. The formal title of course is an Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, but it is to be known as the balanced refugee reform act. Given the continual reference of the government to balancing things and its record of balancing, for example, environmental and economic development, I am not very reassured by the title. It would be good if this were elaborated upon during committee.

This is an extremely important bill. People have been waiting for quite some time for amendments to improve this process. I have heard other members in the House talk about a bill that came forward, was passed and languished. For four years, the government has failed to actually give royal assent to that bill. So these reforms are long overdue, but I do have some concerns about the way in which they were brought forward.

I do want to add at the beginning that I am extremely proud of the efforts, in my constituency and across the city of Edmonton, in assistance to refugees given by the people of Edmonton. I am very proud of the fact that doctors from the University of Alberta have actually established a separate refugee health clinic, recognizing the particular health issues that were not being addressed.

I am also extremely proud of the students at the University of Alberta, who actually sponsor a number of refugees every year. I had the opportunity to go to a reception to meet some of these refugees who attended the University of Alberta. They actually cover their health fees and transportation fees, which is an incredible barrier that needs to be addressed soon by the government and removed. The students were absolutely incredible with how they look after these refugees who come out of camps and have the opportunity to study at the University of Alberta. They are incredible success stories.

It is very important that legislation be brought forward to recognize the need to expedite these reviews, ensuring the rights of all people who come to this country claiming the right of citizenship and bringing forward to us that they need to have our protection to take refuge because they are being treated in some untoward way in the country they come from. A lot of the members in the House have mentioned this and said they welcome the fact that there will now finally be an appeal process at least for some of the claimants. However, I hear members expressing the concern that it will not apply to all claimants.

I have also heard great concern that it is regrettable that this bill was not referred to committee after first reading. I notice that even the Canadian Bar Association's immigration committee as well as Amnesty International have asked that this occur and they have called for a full and extensive public hearing process on this. Both of them have extreme expertise in this area.

One of the issues I have heard raised in the House is the issue of the lag in actually making appointments to the Refugee Appeal Board. I would hope that the government, as I mentioned earlier in the House in a question to one of the members, will give full consideration, as it is moving forward with this bill, to bringing forward in parallel all the regulations and all the guidelines necessary to implement the bill. I also hope it will commit to a full, open and public consultation on those regulations and guidelines. Third, I hope it commits to putting in place the necessary officials and appointments to the board to genuinely move forward and expedite these reviews.

Again as I have mentioned previously in the House, I am very concerned with the reference by the government to the need for fast and fair reviews, when in fact what we should be looking forward to is that they be timely and just. It is absolutely critical that we accord due process to all of the claimants regardless of the outcome of the process. A lot of concerns have been expressed, which I support and which should be addressed fully in committee, to make sure that the bill is actually giving a fair hearing to all the claimants who come forward, and that all the claimants potentially have the opportunity for an appeal.

We have heard often in the House, and I have heard in my constituency from immigrants, about the issue of how traumatized they are when they come and how difficult it is for them to identify who can actually assist them in their appeals, particularly with medical testimony or legal services.

I think that the timeline set in the bill is far too short. As many members have pointed out, particularly if we are dealing with people who have been sexually traumatized, there is a long recovery time and they may need a lot of support so that they build trust in the system. I am particularly concerned about the fast-tracking. I am hoping the government is not thinking in terms of balancing out and doing away with some people's rights and due process.

We are fortunate to be in a country where we actually have a charter of rights and we expect that everybody is given due process. We should give careful consideration to that for the refugee claimants.

One of my colleagues mentioned the concept of potential for duty counsel. This concept has been applied to a number of the tribunals in the province I come from, Alberta. Duty counsel would be a very good idea, particularly at the initial period so that the claimants are aware of the fact that they may be able to apply for legal aid or where they can seek legal counsel to assist them. It would be unfortunate if they lost their claim simply because they did not fully understand the process.

I agree with the ideas put forward by Amnesty International and the Canadian Bar Association that we should be very clear on the principles of this process and we should be very clear that there are not political considerations attached to the criteria for determining if people come from “safe countries”. There are a number of people, including the former chair of the refugee appeal division, who have said they have a problem with the government referencing safe countries, when in fact the legislation does not reference such a term.

As I mentioned, I find the drafting of the bill very confusing. I would think that refugees coming to Canada who do not have English as their first language may have difficulty in comprehending the bill. I hope the guidelines and the regulations bring greater clarity to the process.

It is very important that those resources be in place to work with the refugees. I have also noticed that there is still a tendency to download on to certain support organizations. The government gives assistance to certain categories of immigrants to the country to help them become settled and to go through the processes, but there are certain categories, and I believe refugees are one of those, and good-hearted people who run voluntary non-government organizations are trying to deal with this as well, where resources are not provided. I am hoping when the government brings in these new provisions it will consider giving more support to the NGOs and the role they play.

Earlier I mentioned that we are developing new kinds of refugees in the world, and while we have always had environmental refugees, with the impact of climate change, hundreds of thousands of new people will be coming forward. My concern is with the idea of having “safe designated countries”, we could have a disaster the next day, and if that designation is by regulation, could we move expeditiously enough to allow refugees to apply or to go through the appeal process?

I am told that environmental refugees are quickly becoming the highest category of refugee claimants. I think I have raised this before in the House, that we have two choices in this country. One is that we take action to reduce our own greenhouse gases which are contributing to the problem of climate change, and the other is to step up to the plate and commit what our foreign aid dollars will be to assist those who are already trying to mitigate and adapt to climate change. The greater action we take to prevent environmental devastation in other countries, from drought, starvation from drought and so forth, and we try to mitigate and help people adapt to the impact of climate change, then we do not necessarily have to be accepting more refugees to this country.

That is where we draw the line in the sand. We will have to give assistance one way or another. I would suggest that we will have to be factoring in a lot more environmental refugees applying to this country. Maybe if we step up to the plate and actually commit larger dollars in foreign aid, then we will not have as many refugees wanting to come here.

I certainly know from my personal experience working overseas that nationals of other countries, even if we may wonder how they can stay in their country that is so devastated, love their country and they would like to stay. People come here as refugees only when it is absolutely the last choice and when they want to give an opportunity to their children.

In closing, this is a country that stands by the rule of law. I think it is absolutely critical that we bend over backwards to make sure that we accord due process including to the refugee claimant process.

[Ève-Mary Thaï Thi Lac, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to speak today to the bill that the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism recently introduced in the House.

This refugee bill was eagerly awaited and badly needed. No one will be surprised to hear that the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act was very helpful to my fellow Vietnamese who immigrated to Canada at the same time as I did.

When people ask me about my background, they ask me three questions. First, they ask me where I come from; second, whether I remember the war; and third, whether I was one of the boat people. It is clear that Quebeckers and Canadians understand and agree with the principle of refugees.

This debate coincides with the 35th anniversary of the fall of Saigon. Many people from my country came here as refugees and became prominent citizens, like the refugees from other countries who came and made Quebec and Canada better.

The current act is quite out of date and sometimes gives refugee claimants a bad name. It is high time we modernized it.

On March 30, the federal government introduced Bill C-11 as part of its reform of the refugee system. If it were passed as it stands now, this bill could have a serious negative impact on refugees. It is not enough to pass a law to improve what is not working. What we must do is find a balance and create something that will work.

The Bloc Québécois has asked the government to provide the committee with the regulations so that we can do an exhaustive study, because many measures announced as part of this reform are not included in this bill.

The Bloc Québécois is in favour of studying this bill in committee, and I am proud to say that I will study it carefully, because I am the assistant critic. The member for Jeanne-Le Ber is the Bloc Québécois critic, and he does a very good job, by the way. We make a great team, and the people of Quebec can be glad to have a team like ours, because we will see to it that the flaws in this bill are corrected.

We are happy that the government is finally looking at implementing the refugee appeal division. However, we are disappointed that it is not fair, because not all applicants will have access, which we believe is discriminatory.

When people from designated safe countries are denied at the first level, they will not have access to this appeal division. Even if the government assures us that all files will be examined individually, there is no guarantee that there will be no mistakes.

My colleague from Jeanne-Le Ber pointed this out. We know the statistics of some IRB members. Some of them flatly reject 90% to 95% of the applications they receive, while others show more flexibility. A decision made by one man or one woman is arbitrary. That is why it is not fair that refugees from designated safe countries will not have access to the refugee appeal division.

Another thing: which countries will be designated safe by the minister and the government?

The government is currently working on Bill C-2, An Act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and the Republic of Colombia. The government tells us that a free trade agreement with this country is no problem because Colombia respects human rights.

However, Canada accepts Colombian refugee seekers who claim their rights have been violated in Colombia. Will the minister put Colombia on the list of safe countries? I wonder.

On the one hand, the government says it wants to sign a free trade agreement with Colombia because it is a safe country. On the other hand, it accepts political refugees from that same country because their rights have been violated. What will the minister choose? Will the minister decide to list it as a safe country?

That is why we think that the idea of safe countries is questionable. We do not know where the minister will put Colombia and other countries that do not respect the human rights of women or homosexuals—these are recognized rights.

Even though the Conservative government sometimes has difficulty acknowledging them, these rights are still recognized in Quebec and Canada. What will the minister decide? Will he designate certain countries as safe even though they do not respect human rights, women's right or the rights of homosexuals? What category will these countries be in? It worries me.

A civil servant will make the decision. Applicants from designated safe countries will have no right to appeal. That is far too radical considering that the decision will have been made by a single person. It is possible that an applicant's individual rights will not be respected. He will not have all the rights that other people with the same background but who come from different countries will have.

Statistics for certain board members are alarming. We should not find this kind of unfairness when the decisions are made by civil servants.

It also says that an immigration officer will have 8 days, as opposed to 28, to refer a refugee claim to a first interview with a department official.

Some people are traumatized when they arrive here. They have been abused and pressured. Some come from very corrupt countries. They do not trust the government in the country they came from. When they arrive here, they are told that in eight days they will have to explain their situation to a government official. They have left a corrupt country where their rights were violated. They are told that they have eight days to prepare to explain their situation. That is not very long for people who have suffered such great trauma.

Then, the second hearing happens 60 days later. Do not forget that many refugee status claimants arrive here having left their houses, their families and their jobs with no preparation whatsoever. They did not bring any documents to prove what they are saying. They have to get those documents.

As MPs, we occasionally write to embassies in Africa. Although we have more resources than refugees or applicants, it takes a fairly long time for the mail to get there as well as for the reply to come back.

What will we do when the person does not obtain the documents required for their defence within 60 days? Will their application be refused automatically? Will this person be penalized because they could not provide the necessary documents?

At present, it takes 19 months and now we are talking about 28 days. Perhaps we could find a compromise. I believe there is enough flexibility to do so.

At present, more than 45% of refugee claims are accepted. When refused, the failed claimants can ask the Federal Court for a judicial review. This court presently accepts 13% of applications. Where an error was made in the decision, 2% of requests are allowed. In total, 60% of applicants are successful in the end. The tragedy lies in the fact that many failed applicants have found work, married, had children born in Canada and have learned the language. In other words, they have fully integrated in the host society.

The current backlogs are unacceptable for 40% of the claimants who will be forced leave Canada. This government is largely responsible for these backlogs. Indeed, since 2006, we have gone from 20,000 to 60,000 backlogged claims. We know that over a third of the board members could have rendered decisions, but there are many vacant positions, which has caused this backlog.

As my colleague from Jeanne-Le Ber put it so well earlier, we cannot help but wonder if these delays are arranged on purpose in order to stay within certain quotas set by the government. What will they do in the future to stay within those quotas? Will they deny more claims? This will not serve Quebec or Canada.

We must ensure that this new legislation does not discriminate against claimants and does not deny more claims because they are processed faster. That would be tragic, both for the claimants and for our current system.

It is definitely time to reform this legislation, but that does not mean it should be reformed in a slapdash manner. We can take the time to reform it correctly. There is a difference between saying that it should have been done a long time ago and saying that we will do it too fast, which could lead to other injustices. If we did that, we might improve what is not working, but we would risk undermining the parts that are working. We must ensure that this bill does not create new injustices.

In committee, my colleague from Jeanne-Le Ber and I will ensure that when the time comes to vote on this bill in the House, it will be much improved and will respect the needs of claimants as much as possible. We no longer want to hear that, according to statistics, 60% of claims are completed and are successful. It is sad to hear people say that refugee claimants are abusing the system.

It is an essential system that is desperately needed, but the current legislation is outdated.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak today to Bill C-11. At the outset I, too, want to make note and compliment the minister for getting his bill this far and the fact that he has been here for all of the presentations is a big plus for him. I know that in the provincial legislature, and the only one that I am familiar with is the Manitoba legislature, that is an expected practice. The minister is always there to listen attentively to the speeches of the members. Therefore, I am really impressed that he would do that.

Also, I think there is a bigger issue here. The government is in another iteration as a minority government and it has taken this long for the government to figure out that that is what it is in, a minority government and that majority government possibilities are not guaranteed. Therefore, it has to make the best of the situation it is in.

We look to people like the minister, and he is not alone because there are one or two others over there who show a similar kind of appreciation for how they fit into the grand scheme of things. Unfortunately, there are many people on the government side, members and ministers, who do not appreciate that and it makes it much more difficult to work in a situation like this.

I think that under certain circumstances the government may last the full five years. I know I have said this before but if no one party moves up substantially in support, what would be the point of forcing Canadians to spend millions of dollars for an election that will probably produce the same results.

The fact is that our voters are out there and they want to see results. Whether it is that particular minister, another minister or the government who wants to make accommodations with opposition parties, I think that should be encouraged because it will hold us all in a better stead at the end of the day.

I have always said that there are advantages to minority parliaments. I am a fan of minority governments because I think that they do produce results. We had a very successful run in a minority Parliament of Lester Pearson from 1962 to 1968 where we got the unification of the armed forces. People would have thought that would be impossible to do. We got a new Canadian flag which also at the time seemed like an impossibility. All of that happened during minority situations. I am very positive that this minority situation can produce really good results.

Another point is that all we need to do is look at where this party started, where it warped from. Can we imagine the old Reform Party members looking ahead? I think they would be in a state of shock if they could see what some of their ministers are actually doing. This was a party that was very rigid and extreme in its views and, in some ways, it has come a long way.

I am actually fearful of a majority Conservative government because then we would see the ministers marching in here, dropping the bills on the desk and using a take it or leave it approach.

This particular bill has a lot of potential because of the minority situation. If the government truly wants to get it through, which I think it does, then it is prepared to make some amendments at committee.

One of my colleagues earlier talked about the idea that we should have sent the bill directly to committee and that would have given the committee more authority and more leeway to make more radical changes to the structures of the bill. The government did not agree to do that, which is fine. We now need to work with what is in front of us

I think all the representatives of the opposition parties have indicated that they look forward to the bill going to committee. Therefore, the issue becomes how the bill will play out at the committee stage. That remains to be seen because our critic has some positive things to say about the bill and some negative things to say about the bill. Perhaps some of her concerns can be dealt with and allayed at the committee.

I also want to note that our critic is a very hard worker in this area and understands her critic area very well. More important, she actually gets along with the minister. It is very important in a legislative environment that the critic and the minister get along, to the point where the minister himself mentioned that she had been invited and had attended a briefing session on the bill before it was introduced. That is a battle we had with the previous member. The member for Souris and I, in a past life, sat in sessions at the provincial level. Some ministers would provide information. The ministers who were considered the best and got the best results were the ministers who invited the opposition into their offices and gave them a briefing on the bill. There were other ministers, on the other hand, who just flatly refused and would not allow it at all. At the end of the day, they got poorer results, a rougher ride and a lot more stress than they would have had, had they adopted the more open approach.

I now want to deal with some of the issues in the bill. The refugee issue has been a cause for trouble and concern under previous Conservative and Liberal governments for many years. I remember both the Mulroney government and then the Chrétien government making political appointments to these board and then running into trouble with their decisions. We understand that political parties win elections and become government and it is accepted that they have the right to appoint some of their own people into positions, but this was one area where making blatant political appointments did not work out very well.

We have some stories in Winnipeg where people were literally abusing their positions with the refugee board. We also dealt with the area of immigration consultants, which is just a terrible area. We have had in Manitoba multiple times where immigration consultants have been called on the carpet for charging ridiculous fees, taking advantage of not only poor people and people who are refugees, but on the immigrant investor program, highly educated, intelligent, fairly wealthy immigrants being hoodwinked by shady people in the area of immigration consultants.

I am not sure what the answer is. Manitoba has some laws dealing with the issue provincially that I believe have some merit and work reasonably well, but I am all in favour, and I think all of us probably would be, of trying to rid the landscape of these immigration consultants, because more often than not they are tied into other businesses. They have a travel agency on the side or do income tax on the side. They essentially grab people in a web and control them, capture them and hand them off to one another. It is not the type of environment we want to be in.

Canada has an honourable past but it also has a speckled past in dealing with refugee issues. It is true that we have accepted a higher proportion of refugees, one of the previous speakers mentioned the numbers, relative to our size than any other country in the world, so that is to our credit, but we have other examples in our past for which we are currently not overly proud.

There is a long-standing tradition in many cultures of offering refuge to those fleeing persecution. In Europe, people during the middle ages could seek sanctuary in a church. In fact, there are cases in Winnipeg right now where people are in a church. Giving sanctuary was considered a sacred act.

Americans fleeing slavery were given protection in Canada in the days before the U.S. Civil War. Although there have always been people fleeing oppression, it was not until after World War II that world governments recognized the need to create formal legal obligations for countries to accept refugees. Prior to World War II, there was no legal distinction between immigrants and refugees. Even today, many people are unsure of the difference between the two.

In 1951, the refugee convention defined a refugee as someone who has a well-founded fear of persecution because of race, religion, nationality, membership, social group or political opinion. When we apply a definition like that to what the minister is trying to do, I wonder whether he can see how people might be concerned about the whole issue of a safe countries of origin list. He has a lot of good things in the bill but this is one of the stumbling blocks.

It makes sense administratively and it would be quick and easy to just put a country on a list and say that everybody from that country should be seen in a certain light. However, I think we have moved beyond that in our thinking and want to look at the individual. I know it is hard for people to comprehend that somebody from France, England or the United States could be considered a refugee but the reality is that, even using the definition going back to 1951, there could be people practically under our noses who would qualify because at that point in time there was no list of countries.

I am not on the committee but I can appreciate that there are probably reasons why the minister feels this list of countries is required. He has gone the extra step to let opposition parties know today that he is prepared to work with that list and explained that it was not as black and white and arbitrary as we think.

Now we get into the regulations. Anybody who follows legislation knows that the bill provides the tombstone information that is not going to change but the regulations provide all of the details of how the bill is really going to work in practice. Those are changeable by the minister. If the government or the minister does not like something that requires a regulation change, they can simply go ahead and do it.

In opposition, we are always very careful that we do not give away too much. When we pass a bill, in our own minds we are pretty clear about it, but the reality is that once the regulations get promulgated we find out there are a lot of things in it that we did not really like. That may be part of the problem. If the minister could somehow convince the critics that he is not out to do bad things and has solid arguments, they may be convinced at the end of the day.

At the end of the day we know that no matter what we do we can always make changes. One of the beauties of the democratic system that we have in our country is that if we make mistakes, and we do make them, we have the ability to correct them and try to make them right.

I have some hope, unlike some of the other ministers over there, that in his case it may be possible to do something. It seems to me to be very arbitrary that we could say that people coming out of Hungary must be on that list or they will not qualify as refugees.

That may be true. Let us grant the minister that that may be 100% true. However, we should not be doing it on the basis of putting the country on a list. We should be looking at each individual applicant separately. If the individual does not qualify, then by all means he or she does not qualify.

Major regional bodies have attempted to refine and extend the concept of refugee. In 1969, the Organization of African Unity and in 1984, the Organization of American States, OAS, extended the refugee definition to people fleeing generalized violence in these regions. Today, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the international organization that safeguards the rights of refugees, estimates that there are 12 million refugees and over 6.3 million internally displaced people who are in need of protection.

There are people living in refugee camps in the Middle East who are probably into the second generation. I could be wrong. I do not think anybody is third generation. In my mind, that is where we should be putting a lot of our attention and concern. People are living in tent cities and they are stuck there for years and years. To me, it would be very easy to decide that they would qualify as refugees.

I would assume that is where church groups are really important in this whole process. They have been historically and have done a fabulous job. I remember that churches were involved in bringing the Vietnamese boat people over to Canada. Churches were very involved in that whole area. They should be encouraged. They have a sense of where the problems are in the world. They know that the people living in the refugee camps are people who need help right away. I trust their compass and direction in how to deal with the refugee situation.

Today, there are 12 million refugees and 6.3 million people who are internally displaced. Those are huge numbers. I do not have the statistic at my fingertips, but we are only dealing with 100,000 out of those 12 million per year. By the time we work our way through that group of people, there will probably be more people on the list.

Somebody was adding up the number of wars in the world and came up with 30 to 50 wars that the average person would not even know existed. We could ask the average constituent questions about whether there is a war going on in the Congo or elsewhere and they would be totally unaware of it. The fact of the matter is that people are only aware of issues when they see them on the television news on a particular night. They are quite aware of what is going on in Afghanistan and Iraq, but beyond that, the awareness just is not there.

Madam Speaker, did you indicate one minute? I do not see that well. Time certainly does fly. I have not even started on this. Maybe I will have to go to committee and see how the committee process works.

I did want to talk about the bad experiences we have had here in Canada. Anti-Semitic immigration policy proved deadly in the years leading up to World War II, when European Jews were refused entrance into Canada.

In 1939 the ship St. Louis left Germany carrying over 900 European Jews seeking refuge and protection on the other side of the Atlantic. They were refused everywhere they went. They had to return to Europe and most of those people died in concentration camps. That is an example of a very bad situation in our history.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is a privilege to speak to Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act. This bill came out of a lot of work that was done when the Liberals were in government in 2004 to 2006. We are pleased to see the minister has listened to members from all political parties and has tried to craft the bill in a way that will deal with something that has been a very vexing challenge for any government that has served our nation.

All of us know and hear about the tragic stories and have met refugees who have come to our country. They have endured lengths of time of great uncertainty in their lives, fleeing countries and environments that have been, at best, disconcerting to them and, at worst, life-threatening to them and their families.

The stories of terror and horror that they, their families and loved ones have been subjected to are often difficult for those of us who have lived in our beautiful country to understand or truly empathize with. It is a reality in far too many countries where the milk of human kindness does not run through some of their leaders and they and the people who follow them have inflicted crimes against individuals that are beyond our worst nightmares. Yet the people who members see in their offices have come to our country to find a better life, security, enjoy freedom and, above all else, to be protected and free of the kind of viciousness and brutality that infects too many countries in the world.

The genesis of the bill is to ensure that individuals who come to our country, or are selected to be refugees or apply to be refugees are true refugees in our country and are able to go through a process that enables them to enter into Canada in an expeditious fashion with uncertainties removed. More important, it ensures that individuals who try to take advantage of the system, queue jump and enter our country from other countries with no just cause are not allowed into the country, that they are removed from the system and sent back to their countries of origin expeditiously and that the moneys that come from our citizens are used wisely and responsibly.

The Liberal Party will support the bill going to committee. We do this not because we think it is a perfect bill, it is far from it, but we believe it is important and responsible for us to ensure the bill gets to committee where witnesses can appear and members of the committee from all parties can ask the tough questions, which will allow us to ensure the bill is crafted in the most responsible and effective way possible.

We are, however, concerned that the government took four years to put together a bill such as this, given the fact that Conservatives and their offices, like ours, have heard about the challenges and problems within the immigration and refugee system. It is very important that at the end of the day the bill be rooted in fairness and efficiency.

The reform package incorporates recommendations that have come from the Liberal Party, including the establishment of a refugee appeal process. The government, however, has given no guarantees that the backlog of refugee claims will be addressed any time soon. We are concerned that it will not preserve the fundamental rights of all claimants. We have called for assurances from the government to ensure that the new refugee reform measures will actually reduce the backlog and ensure that we have a balanced refugee system that will ensure individual rights.

Why does the backlog exists? It is important to go back to look at history. The government, for reasons known only to it, has spent an extraordinary amount of time dragging its heels, not filling chronic vacancies that exist within the Immigration and Refugee Board.

In the first place, we feel the appointment process, as has happened in many other areas, has been heavily politicized. By not having a full board has resulted in an explosion of refugee claimants. Right now there is a backlog of 63,000 applicants waiting in line. This has not always been the case. Prior to the Conservatives forming government, 20,000 people were waiting in line. That number has exploded to 63,000 because the government has failed to make appointments in an effective and efficient manner.

This malaise that affects the government's inability or unwillingness to appoint people to boards and to structures that are important to the function of our nation has infected other areas. The Veterans Review and Appeal Board is a good example. This is an important appeal board that resolves challenges facing our veterans. The government has heavily politicized this board, too, by appointing individuals who do not have the competence to handle these complex cases. As a result, we are seeing a backlog in the Veterans Review and Appeal Board and we are seeing that in the immigration and refugee appeal board system.

The government has failed to deal with this big challenge. In the process it has really done a huge disservice to our country and our citizens. The function of these government appointed boards relies on them having a full complement or an effective critical mass of people who can do the job. If these boards do not have that, we see an inefficient execution of the duties of those boards and people suffer as a result.

I want to go back to the Veterans Review and Appeal Board, which has to do with our veterans, veterans who have given to our country, veterans who have served our nation, veterans who need good health to maintain their standard of living. Our veterans have served our country throughout their lives, but when they need assistance and go to the VRAB they find a mess, which results in a lot of them suffering. I appeal to the government to grasp what I have said and fix the system because it cannot continue in its current form.

We need to have a fair and just process that will take the concerns relating to safe country of origin seriously. My colleagues and others in the House have mentioned that. We want to ensure that we have the tools to deter refugee fraud, while at the same time protect bona fide refugees.

One of the major concerns of the Liberal Party with respect to this is ensuring that true refugees come in to Canada, but we deter fraud and weed out those individuals who abuse the system. We need to protect those bona fide refugees who want to come to Canada, sometimes need to come to our country to protect their own lives.

Elements of the bill also seem to be somewhat improvised. The government has committed more than $540 million over five years toward reforms that it wants to implement, and that is a good thing. However, this number was simply not in this month's budget. It comes just after the government announced a freeze on departmental spending.

If the government is committing $540 million to implement these reforms, but is planning to freeze spending, then where is it going to get the money? Is the government going to cut something else? If it is going to cut something else, then what is it going to cut? We only have silence from the government. The responsible thing for the government to do would be to let the Canadian public and the House know where it will get the money to do this.

Canadians also cannot afford the gross mismanagement that occurred last year when the government took a really ham-fisted approach toward Mexico and the Czech Republic by putting visa restrictions on the two countries. It seemed like a band-aid solution and a knee-jerk response to a spike in refugee claims from these two countries. We know what the government's intent was, and do not dispute it for a second, but the way in which it did this was extremely damaging to our country.

By announcing out of the blue visa restrictions on Mexico, with no consultation, for example, the government cost many companies hundreds of millions of dollars. Language training groups, tourism companies and others relied on being able to attract people from Mexico. They had contracts signed for them to come to Canada so they could learn English, which has happened for a long time. That was stopped cold. There was a great deal of uncertainty. Many people's lives and businesses were ruined by this glib, offhand implementation of visa restrictions last year.

You and I know, Madam Speaker, from living on Vancouver Island, that this affected quite number of businesses in our communities and cost them millions of dollars. In fact, some of them went out of business. It was completely unnecessary. As I said before, I fully understand where this was coming from with respect to the spike in claimants. We know some of the rationale behind that and some of the legitimate concerns the government had with respect to that spike.

However, our contention is there was a better way of doing this. I would posit for the government that if it considers doing something like that in the future, it should consult with the businesses involved that could be hurt by this. It should listen to a number of the companies that benefit from bilateral relations with these countries. Their concerns from an industrial perspective and an economic perspective need to be listened to.

I would submit that listening to them would enable the government to come out with a better series of solutions to deal with the very real challenge they were faced with at that point in time. We are certainly willing to work with the government to provide it with information and ideas on this. I know it has its sources to utilize, too.

This is a little background. In 2004 the former Liberal government implemented changes to the appointment process to the Immigration and Refugee Board. These changes included an advisory panel made up of a number of individuals involved in the refugee process, which screened all applicants for the IRB.

When the current government came to power, it delayed appointments to the board, while it reviewed the process, which was its right to do. However, then it structured the system so the government could simply appoint half the people as members of the panel. It held off on appointments to do that. Rather than pursue a course based on merit, it has pursued a course based much more on politics. As I said before, this delay caused a massive spike in the backlog, from 20,000 to 63,000 now.

We know our folks at Citizenship and Immigration Canada work very hard. The minister knows this very well. They are tireless and all of us try to work very hard in our constituencies. My staff, Jeff and Vikki, in my Victoria office work very hard to try to resolve these issues in a timely fashion. It takes up a lot of their time.

The members and staff at Citizenship and Immigration Canada work very hard, but I would submit for the minister that he would be well-served to listen to the on the ground members of his ministry, those who work in the trenches and who do the person-to-person work. He would be well advised to ask them directly how he could change the system in a more effective way. In doing so, he would be getting information from those staff members who work on the ground and have to deal with the challenges every day.

He would also be wise to ask the tireless individuals who work for us as members of Parliament in our constituency offices about what they face. They have some very good ideas and solutions that the minister could utilize to ensure we have a better immigration system.

By listening to his staff, the staff who work in our offices and those who have gone through the immigration and refugee process, I think he would have three populations that could provide him with a lot of constructive solutions to make a better bill, one that would serve Canadians, immigrants and refugees very well.

Because of the changes the government introduced in terms of the appointment process, the chair of the board resigned and alluded to the fact that the politicization of the board was a factor in the chair's departure.

In the March 2009 status report of the Auditor General of Canada, chapter 2, Ms. Fraser noted her concerns regarding the timely and efficient appointments and reappointments of decision makers to the IRB. Ms. Fraser said very clearly that this process and how this is being done is something that is of great concern to her.

In addition to the growing backlog of applications, the recent spike in claims from certain countries has resulted in an ad hoc method of visa restrictions to constrict application volume. As I said before, we saw this in Mexico and the Czech Republic. We certainly hope that the government does not have a repeat performance on this because what would happen is that we would see simply another choke point in the system that would not serve things well at all.

The bill certainly provides a lot of further flexibility to the minister to deal with unusual spikes in refugee claims from democratic source countries and streamlining the removal process for unsuccessful applicants. We certainly support the streamlining of the removal of unsuccessful applicants. Right now the situation is actually quite grim in the sense that it takes an excessive amount of time for individuals to be processed.

I think the bill should be commended that it proposes changes to every stage in the in-Canada process. Currently people with successful claims are waiting an average of 19 months for a decision, and it takes an average of 4.5 years to process and remove an unsuccessful claimant. Obviously this is unacceptable, and we want to make sure that when the bill goes to committee the process that comes out of this is going to ensure that the wait time for individuals is going to be less than 19 months. That is a very cruel length of time, and the time it takes to actually process and remove an unsuccessful claimant at 4.5 years is also completely unfair to Canadians.

Some of the things the government wants to do at this point in time include having an information-gathering period, which currently is 28 days. It wants to shorten this to eight days. That seems like wishful thinking on its part, and I submit that is really not where the big backlog is that is causing a problem. There are other areas that can be much lengthier.

For example, the first-level decision phase is done by a government-appointed counsel appointee and is done within 18 months. Under the new process the first-level decisions would be made within the IRB within 60 days. That is a welcome objective, because if we could shorten that period of time from 18 months to 60 days, we would certainly have a much more efficient and effective system. However, we want to ensure that the individual, who is making these claims and will be the subject of these investigations, will be treated fairly under the system.

What is important also is the appeal process. Primary concern for us is that the introduction of a refugee appeal division must ensure that the first-level decisions that are going to be conducted will be done in a way that protects procedural fairness and fundamental justice sufficiently to avoid the RAD's becoming another bottleneck in the process.

If we look at the U.K.'s example, and that would be a worthy one to do, the U.K. has had a number of significant challenges in implementing this. In fact, in its process it has had a huge backlog of up to half a million asylum cases as of 2008 and it can take, get this, it is quite remarkable, 10 to 18 years to resolve. That is quite remarkable.

I know my time is ending, but I want to offer one other suggestion concerning refugees. Their children have a great deal of difficulty and there is a remarkable project called the Sage Youth project run by a remarkable immigrant called Tamba Dhar. She did this in Toronto. Essentially she provided children with mentors from their own community who would empower these children who may not have had good family situations. They provided solid adult anchors for those children within their own communities. I strongly encourage the government to work with the provinces to take a look at what Tamba Dhar has done with the Sage Youth program because the outcome is that these children were able to stay in school. None of them has run afoul of the law. They were not taking drugs. They had better outcomes. They had better employment outcomes and better educational outcomes.

I look forward to any questions.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to be here to speak to Bill C-11, which provides for equitable reforms with respect to refugees. It is about time we looked at this because the process for dealing with refugee claims submitted by people who show up at our border crossings has been a big problem for a long time now. These people come to Canada claiming to have been persecuted in their home countries. Because they get no protection there, they come here to ask Canada for protection.

The number of claims awaiting processing has skyrocketed over the past few years. Processing delays are far too long for all cases, particularly those based on the Geneva convention, which defines a refugee claimant. People who submit claims live in limbo for years, but they deserve a faster response.

This also happens to other persecuted individuals in extremely difficult circumstances around the world. These people submit their refugee claims in good faith because in many cases, they believe the legal definition applies to them, but their cases are dismissed after they have spent several years in Canada. They may have jobs, friends, families, houses. The wait times are also far too long for some unscrupulous opportunists who take advantage of the situation to try to stay in Canada as long as possible or even permanently.

This problem is due in large part to negligence on the part of the current and former governments, which hired too few members. This has been the norm at the Immigration and Refugee Board for a long time now. When there are not enough board members to process claims, when staffing levels are only two-thirds what they should be, fewer claims are processed and wait times go up.

I have a very hard time understanding this situation. Why did the government not take action sooner? Why did it not take steps to shorten wait times?

The committee often studies what is going on in immigration. I have become deeply convinced that, unfortunately, wait times are being used as a tool to manage the arrival of immigrants or, in this case, refugees. Allow me to explain.

Normally, in the health care system, wait times are due to an insufficient allocation of resources, which is involuntary because resources are scarce. Because more people need services than there are resources allocated, wait times increase over time. That is why only a certain number of people can be treated every year.

Where immigration is concerned, it is somewhat the reverse situation. Insufficient resources are voluntarily allocated to processing claims so as to not exceed the quotas and objectives that have been set. This is never acknowledged officially or publicly, but almost everyone agrees that only a certain number of people can be admitted to Canada every year.

Society has the ability to absorb a number of people from all over the world. Means are therefore sought to try and control the influx. For many years, it suited governments to have prolonged processing times. It helped slow down the influx of refugees, who figured it would be complicated to get into Canada and that it would take a few years. This acted as a disincentive.

It became a problem when the government lost control and found itself with long wait periods and a process so complicated that it almost acts as an incentive for people to come to Canada. They figure that their claims will take years to process and, during that time, they will be in a safe country and will not have to fear for their safety.

So previous governments and the current government are to blame for part of the problem, but at least we have a bill before us that is aimed at tackling the problem.

I recognize that there is a problem and that it is good to have a bill to deal with that problem. I believe that this bill contains some interesting principles. The Bloc Québécois will support it at second reading to send it to committee.

We asked that this bill be sent to committee even before second reading so that we would have complete latitude to study it and suggest constructive improvements. But the government did not opt to go that route. I hope that if we work together in committee to make the bill better, we will not get bogged down in “proceduritis”.

Let us look at the main elements of the bill. No one will be surprised that I am going to start with the refugee appeal division. This bill finally provides for implementing this division, even though it has been in the act for quite some time. In fact, the 2001 Immigration and Refugee Protection Act provided for an appeal division. At the time, two board members considered a refugee claim at the same time, and all it took was for one member to approve the claim for the claimant to be accepted. In 2001, the previous Liberal government told Parliament that it would reduce the number of board members from two to one, but that it would create a refugee appeal division to make up for the change and avoid arbitrary decisions. This Parliament voted for that. But the Liberal government unfortunately never implemented its own act and the refugee appeal division, and the Conservatives have not done so either.

That is why the Bloc Québécois has repeatedly tried to force the government to implement the division, the last time being when it introduced Bill C-291, which was passed at second reading but unfortunately defeated by a single vote at third reading because of a rather pathetic Liberal tactic.

I do not agree with the Conservatives' positions, but at least they were honest about the fact that they were opposed to the refugee appeal division and would vote against it. The NDP and the Bloc said they were in favour of the refugee appeal division and said they would vote to support it. The Liberals, on the other hand, said they supported it, but curiously, during the vote, 12 members were absent, that is, double the number of absent members of all the other parties combined.

The vote before and the vote after the vote in question were won by the three opposition parties by three votes, but when the time came to vote on Bill C-291, four Liberal members mysteriously remained seated and coincidentally, the bill was defeated by a single vote. That is a lot of coincidences at once. As we all know, that was the Liberals' strategy to try to appease their electoral base while still defeating the bill in the House.

I do not mean to dwell on the past, but I thought it was important to remind the House of what happened.

Let us now look forward. Why is the refugee appeal division necessary? Contrary to what is indicated in the bill before us, why should it apply to everyone?

All of our legal systems include the opportunity to appeal. The reason is very simple: because justice is administered by humans and humans can make mistakes, the system recognizes that the justice system can make mistakes.

Opportunities for appeal will therefore be included everywhere to correct potential errors.

The bill also proposes appeal mechanisms in our legal systems to ensure uniformity. The goal is to ensure a reasonable expectation that a certain type of case, say x, will produce a certain outcome and that every case like case x will produce that same outcome. That is not how it works at the moment.

Here is an example of how similar claims were treated differently by IRB members. This happened to twins, brothers from the same country. Their claims were reviewed by two different board members, and each one made a completely different decision. The cases were alike, they were brothers who had been through the same thing together, yet the board members did not make the same decision. Clearly, there is a lack of coherence. An appeal division would have made it possible to determine which board member was wrong or mistaken.

Appeal mechanisms seek to eliminate arbitrary treatment by giving our legal systems oversight over lower-level rulings. Some board members have rejected as many as 98% of the claims they have dealt with, while others have allowed nearly every claim that has gone before them.

If I were in court one day and someone told me before the hearing that the judge convicted in 98% of his or her cases, I would know that justice was not being served and that it was a farce. I would know the dice were loaded. But in a typical legal system with an appeal division, if every decision made by a board member or judge was overturned on appeal, the chief justice would eventually tell the judge that his or her rulings were a problem.

The same applies to the IRB. An appeal process ensures that those making the decisions in the first place really think them through. Decision makers have to remember that their decisions can be appealed. They have to really think about their decisions and consider whether they are likely to be upheld or systematically appealed.

That is not in the legislation. I know that there have been some intense discussions with the minister about the current potential for appeals in the legislation. There is none. I have been saying it all along, and I will say it again today. There are ways of getting around it, such as the judicial review process at the Federal Court. Very few applications are accepted. In all cases, only the procedural aspect of the application is examined. No one can request a judicial review on the basis of the facts. For example, if a member says that he does not believe a person's story and does not think he is credible, the Federal Court would never say that his story was credible and approve his application.

There is the issue of pre-removal risk assessments. This procedure is very rarely applied. In fact, only 2% of the applications involving new facts since the initial hearing are accepted. It is not truly an appeal mechanism. Neither is a permanent resident application on humanitarian grounds. Some people use it as a second attempt if they think there was an error with their case at the initial hearing. It does not fall under the definition of refugee status as adopted by the conventions supported by Canada.

I have spent a lot of time talking about the appeal division. I think that natural justice is something really fundamental, and we cannot ignore it. The problem with the bill before us is the exemption for so-called safe countries. The minister said that he would create a list, but we have no details about that yet, and people who come from these so-called safe countries will not have access to the refugee appeal division.

Finally, the bill takes a positive step by implementing the refugee appeal division and—let us be frank—by improving it in certain ways, for instance, with the possibility of presenting new evidence and testifying again. Nevertheless, a certain proportion of asylum seekers will not have this opportunity. In my opinion, that is a mistake. When it comes to equality of the most basic rights, we must not treat people differently based on their country of origin. That seems obvious to me.

When a person appears before a tribunal that will make a decision far less significant than one where the person could potentially be sent back to be tortured, killed or persecuted, the tribunal does not take the person's country of origin into account. When neighbours are in a dispute over a fence, neither party would ever be denied the right to appeal based on their country of origin. Everyone is treated equally, regardless of where they are from.

I do not see why this distinction would be made in the case of refugees. It is not necessary. The bill already provides for an expedited process, namely by suspending for one year the possibility of applying for a pre-removal risk assessment, a temporary resident permit or permanent residency on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. These options that were once available to refugees no longer appear in the legislation. We do not think it is necessary to go so far as to prevent people from safe countries from using the appeal division.

I will now say a few words on the issue of deadlines, which are of particular concern to me. Deadlines do not figure in the bill, but I imagine they will be included in the regulations. It seems that the minister intends to give refugees eight days from the time refugee status is claimed to the time they meet with an IRB officer for help with the application. As I was saying earlier, although generally speaking it is a good idea to expedite the process, in some cases this can be problematic.

When a refugee from another country who has been persecuted and perhaps raped several times arrives in Canada, they are told that they have one week to tell their whole story. Many psychologists would say that you can work with a rape victim, for example, for months before they start talking about their experience. Perhaps we should include mechanisms to correct this. In addition, the interview will be used later, during the hearing and possibly the appeal, to discredit the person. They will be asked why they did not report certain things during the initial interview. We must ensure that the person's psychological state during the interview makes it possible to truly tell their story.

I also have concerns about the timeframe for the hearing, which is 60 days. It is a good thing if applicants who are ready do not have a long wait for their hearing. In some cases, however, it may be extremely difficult to obtain the evidence and documents that might be very far away. In some parts of the world, it can take two weeks for a document to arrive and another two weeks to send it back. That adds up to a month, leaving only 30 days for the lawyer to prepare the case.

Finally, I am very worried by the fact that, by and large, these reforms will be made by regulation, thus sidestepping Parliament. In addition, there is the matter of the timeframes I spoke about, the designation of safe countries, the assisted voluntary returns program that I did not have time to talk about, and so forth.

Yesterday's news reported on the case of a sick, pregnant woman, locked in prison and waiting to be deported. The government sometimes lacks compassion. Therefore, we are very reluctant to give it carte blanche. For that reason, we are asking the minister to submit the regulations in full before proceeding with a clause-by-clause analysis in committee. Thus, when we vote on the bill, we will at least be familiar with the proposed regulations.

I will be pleased to answer my colleagues' questions.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

First, Mr. Speaker, I wish to inform you that I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Brossard—La Prairie.

As the member for Laval—Les Îles, I rise today in Parliament to speak on a very difficult piece of legislation, Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act. These proposed amendments deal with the fundamental right of individuals to seek protection in other countries, and specifically in Canada, when their government wilfully refuses to protect its citizens.

Instead, many of these individuals live in terror, afraid for their lives and for those of their families. In some instances, they are subjected to decades of civil war. They are subjected to cruel and unusual torture, in most instances at the hands of their own government, the same government that had pledged to serve and protect their human rights.

I also speak today in the House for the voices of the many women and children who have been subjected to force and violent rape by armies given the authority to ethnically cleanse a country. All this is done while the government stands silent. It not only does not protect its citizens but it does not even bring the perpetrators to justice. Many of the more than 50 wars that are going on in the world today have been going on for decades. The number of victims runs in the millions. Today, if the amendments that we will be asking for are not allowed to be incorporated into Bill C-11, then Canada's Conservative government will take away those rights to protection.

In the few minutes I have before me, I will speak to three areas of this bill: first, the eight-day rule, second, the right to remain in Canada on humanitarian and compassionate grounds and, third, the notion of safe country of origin or, as described in clause 12, proposed section 109.1, designated countries of origin, where parts of a country within a country would be considered safe by the Canadian refugee authorities.

Implementing an eight-day information-gathering rule goes against everything Parliament has put in place to allow claimants a fair and impartial refugee hearing with the support of competent legal counsel. Eight days is not enough to give counsel time to gain the trust of the claimants.

I am talking about people who go through many countries before they get to Canada, who have lived illegally and who have slept just about anywhere before they came here. We are asking them to sit down with a lawyer, explain their problem and try to give all the details within the very short time of eight days. How can we expect a poor man, women or child, because often children come all by themselves without the help and support of their parents, to trust that person who is in front of them within eight days?

Eight days is definitely not sufficient. Eight days is not enough time to secure adequate cultural interpretation. We know, for the majority of the time, that counsel would be working with a third language. Very few of the refugee claimants who we receive in this country speak one of the two official languages.

On the issue of humanitarian and compassionate grounds, the bill before us would require a claimant to wait a full year before reapplying after his or her claim for refugee status has been rejected. These people will be in complete limbo during that one year period. What would happen if, after discussions with a lawyer, a claimant realized that his or her claim was made on the wrong grounds, given the situation he or she experienced? What if the claimant wants to withdraw a claim and make a new one on humanitarian and compassionate grounds this time?

Claimants who withdraw their claims before the hearing date should be entitled to apply for permanent residency. Under this bill, however, claimants who withdraw their claims before their IRB hearing date have nowhere else to turn. All doors and windows are then closed to them. They currently have no other choice than to face removal.

I would like to speak about a case I heard about last night, that of a young woman from Guinea, in Africa, who was a victim of spousal abuse and who will now be deported from Canada. Her abuse by her partner was so severe that she is permanently branded on her left breast, and even underneath, from the mark of a hot iron. When she tried to get the authorities in her country to protect her, she was not able to get the authorities to do so. That is exactly what a refugee is, somebody who goes to the authorities in her own country and does not get the protection of the police and of the judicial system.

According to her Montreal counsel, our system denied her refugee status. She told us and friends of hers told us that if she were to go back to her country of Guinea, then she would be again under the control of this man who so cruelly abused her.

Not only has Canada's humanitarian and compassionate system failed to allow this woman to remain, but we are sending her back on Tuesday, although she is now married to a Canadian citizen and is now in a high-risk pregnancy. Tuesday is tomorrow.

Here are some of the details. One, if she is forced to go back to her country, the chances are very, very high that she will run into the man who was her first husband, who will very likely never understand or accept that she has now remarried. Two, she is now in a high-risk pregnancy. She cannot really be put into an airplane.

Where is the clemency? Where is the justice? Where is the compassion? Where are the humanitarian grounds on which the minister could allow this woman and her unborn child to stay here, because it is up to the minister and his department?

Her counsel, who has sent me a copy of a letter that was recently written to the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, said that her Canadian physicians, right here in Canada, in Montreal, have confirmed that travelling would be extremely dangerous.

This is one case among many. Before I became a member of Parliament, I was a member of the IRB, the Immigration and Refugee Board.

As an IRB member, I reviewed hundreds and hundreds of cases. It is true that, in some cases, there are individuals who try to push through our system, but it is also true that the vast majority of people whose cases we see are like this woman from Guinea who needs our help.

My colleague, the MP for Vaughan, has declared that on this side of the House, the refugee appeals division was happy that at last it will be implemented. I am certainly happy personally, but it is clear that claimants will not be in Canada long enough to allow them to be present for those appeals. How can a refugee claimant appear before the appeals division to make her case heard if the new law implements a short eight-day period to gather information?

Other MPs have talked about the most controversial aspect of Bill C-11: the Immigration and Refugee Board will hear the case but the applicant will not be able to appeal to the IRB. Furthermore, this is all tied to the decision that will be made by the department or the minister—we are not exactly sure which one—regarding the designation of safe countries.

When I was a member of the IRB, we received refugee claims from Sri Lanka. People were told that if they went to Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka, they would find refuge and would not need to come to Canada. It was not recognized that, in Sri Lanka, it was perhaps harder to travel to the capital than it is in Canada because of the dangers faced by the refugee claimant.

The bill does not say which authority will be responsible for designating safe countries or the criteria to be used. I would like to share some anecdotes based on my experience as a former member of the board.

There are some countries in Europe where homosexuality is recognized and is not illegal. They are democratic countries, as the minister rightly stated earlier. However, from my experience on the Board, I know that when some homosexuals arrive in Canada, they say that they were beaten and persecuted in their country of origin and that they went to the police but did not receive any protection. The laws of their country also did not afford them protection.

Although there may be a law on the books, that does not mean they have protection. Although a country is democratic, that does not mean that these people will be protected in the outlying, rural, mountainous areas of that country. Protection on paper is one thing, and it is important; however, it is not the same as real protection. People are persecuted and are unable to obtain help from their country and its justice system.

We must ensure that our Canadian law can distinguish between people who wish to take advantage of our system and those who do are not protected by their country's justice system.

Just because a country is democratic does not mean that it will protect its citizens when necessary.

My comments are based on discussions I have also had with NGOs that have worked with refugee claimants for years and know the system very well.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

I appreciate the minister's applause. He did speak about that in his remarks as well. However, there have been failures of our immigration refugee policy that left people unprotected. One of the most egregious of those cases was the Jewish refugees who came to Canada during World War II and were not welcomed and were turned away. There were also the people on board the Komagata Maru who arrived in Vancouver at the turn of the last century and were returned to India.

Our failure to welcome refugees has had terrible consequences as well for those individuals. When we turn away someone whose life is in danger, the possibilities are not very positive, to say the least.

However, Canada overall has been known as a country that welcomes refugees and does it in a way that most other countries do not, which is something that is very significant. We were recognized by the United Nations for our efforts in refugee resettlement in 1986 with the Nansen medal. Canada is the only country to have been recognized in this way. Other individuals and agencies have been recognized but Canada remains the only country to have received the Nansen medal.

One of the successes of Canada's refugee policy has been the fact that there has been a significant grassroots and community involvement in refugee resettlement. We have seen that in most of our communities. There are individuals who participated in the resettlement of a refugee and worked with a family, for instance. Many agencies and community organizations work on these issues. Many of them are related to the private sponsorship program, which has been an inspired part of Canada's refugee legislation, where groups of Canadians can get together and participate directly in helping the resettlement of refugees and refugee families in Canada. That was a brilliant policy decision and continues to be a backbone of our refugee policy.

Canadian churches have been very active in sponsoring and resettling refugees in Canada and they remain one of the key players in our refugee policy.

All of this has led to the fact that there is considerable ownership of our refugee policy at a grassroots level in Canada. Because so many Canadians have been directly involved in the refugee process, they believe they have an important interest in the policies and in legislation of the kind we are debating today.

Canadians recognize that the job is not done and far from it. Millions of people still languish in refugee camps near trouble spots around the world. That number is not reducing in a significant way and continues to be very troubling. The conditions in those refugee camps are also very difficult.

Far too many people are still persecuted, even to death, for their political views or for their race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation or gender identity around the world. Steadily, in many ways, we have been making it harder for those people to escape their own country and find a safe haven here in Canada.

We did things like the safe third country agreement with the United States that said that if a refugee came through the United States before making a claim in Canada they could be returned to the United States. I think that was abandoning Canada's responsibility to those people when Canada's policy was different from that of the United States when it came to offering people protection.

We introduced things like documentation requirements before people board airlines to fly to Canada ensuring they had documentation when often many refugees and people who are escaping persecution do not have the required documents.

In recent years, our refugee determination system has been a mess, frankly, because we have used it as a political football. We have seen many political considerations given, political appointments in terms of people who were sitting on the IRB, and other ways that we have played games with our refugee system at the cost of protecting people. That has resulted in huge backlogs in our refugee determination process.

Our previous governments, both Liberal and Conservative, have allowed this backlog to grow. At the end of the last Liberal government, the Liberals had taken some important steps to improve the situation. They had made progress with regard to the backlog and the Immigration and Refugee Board, the IRB, was at a point where it was almost caught up in a sense when the Conservatives came to power in 2006. There was still a backlog but there will always be a backlog situation in any of these agencies. However, the IRB was to the point of believing that the backlog was manageable and one that would not have produced many serious delays at that point.

Unfortunately, when the Conservatives came to power I think they played politics with the IRB. They refused to reappoint board members who had been appointed by the Liberals and they also refused to appoint new board members. The result was that the backlog ballooned back to where it had been in earlier years. As a result of that backlog, the unfairness also grew. We lost many experienced people from the IRB in that period. The IRB lost that experience, that ability to do an effective and fair job.

The Auditor General even became involved when she warned that the system was collapsing under the huge backlog. This is another situation where the IRB and refugee process as a political football came back into play. I believe the crisis today was created by the Conservatives, by the current government, and now they are creating a solution to the problem that they created. It is a bit of a revolving door and one that continues to concern me.

Conservative and Liberal governments have also shown great disrespect to the existing immigration and refugee law, and that is primarily for their refusal to implement the refugee appeal division which is a feature of the current Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. This act was brought in and debated in 2001, given royal assent in 2002 and contains a provision for a refugee appeal division, something that the minister described as “dormant”. Well the reality was that the Liberals and Conservatives refused to implement that part of the law that had been debated and passed here in the House of Commons and in the Senate. It was never implemented. I think the refugee appeal division would have brought a measure of fairness to our refugee determination system.

The refugee appeal division, RAD, came about through negotiation when the government of the day wanted to move from two member boards at refugee hearings to one member boards. The compromise to ensure fairness was the refugee appeal division. It was not an expensive proposition. It would have cost $8 million to $10 million to establish and $2 million a year to run, not a significant sum in terms of our overall expenditure in the refugee program, but it would have added a measure of fairness to that process.

There was a distinct lack of respect for the process in the past and I wonder if the current legislation before us has a provision for a refugee appeal division, but I do not know. My expectation of fairness of actually seeing that implemented, I have to say, I am a little cynical given our experience with the existing RAD and the fact that it was never implemented.

The NDP has always called for an effective, fair and streamlined refugee process and we have said that there are some principles that need to be the foundation of our refugee determination process. We believe that each case should be assessed on its individual merit. We believe in the need to invest in high quality initial decisions and that we need to get it right the first time. It needs to be a non-political process and the decisions need to be made by an independent body. It needs to be a simple system that avoids unnecessary rules. The necessary resources to ensure that the system functions appropriately need to be in place so that backlogs can be avoided. We also need to remember at all times that human lives are at stake and that we need to uphold human rights standards throughout this important process.

New Democrats have long proposed some specific measures for a fast and fair refugee process. These include that all appointments of IRB board members should be done by an independent appointment commissioner with set criteria for expertise in refugee matters. Such a merit-based appointments process was championed by our former leader, Ed Broadbent. We believe that there needs to be a crackdown on unscrupulous immigration consultants by banning them from the Immigration and Refugee Board hearing room and providing legal aid for proper representation. A provision for appropriate legal representation for refugee claimants continues to be a real issue in our refugee determination system.

We believe that we need to hire more permanent refugee protection officers to clear the backlog. We have seen this done in the past with some success. We also believe that we need to set up the refugee appeal division so that consistent decisions can be made based on fact and law. Parliament mandated, as I mentioned, this refugee appeal division in 2001 but the Liberals and Conservatives chose to ignore the law and not put it in place.

Bill C-11 has some serious flaws. Some of the key organizations that have an interest in the refugee process have outlined some of the problems.

Whenever I look for information on our refugee process, I look to the work of the Canadian Council for Refugees, which is an umbrella organization of many Canadian refugee serving organizations. It has delineated its concerns with this legislation, which I believe merit close attention. One of its key concerns is the designated countries of origin list. This bill would empower the minister to designate countries whose nationals would not have access to the refugee appeal process. This is the so-called safe countries of origin list. The council points out that the word safe does not appear anywhere in Bill C-11, which seems somewhat problematic given the intent of this legislation.

The council also believes that this is an unfair proposal because treating claimants differently based on country of origin is discriminatory. It believes that each case must be assessed individually. It believes that some claimants will be particularly hurt, including women who are making gender-based claims and persons claiming on the basis of sexual orientation. In many countries that are otherwise considered peaceful or safe, there can be serious problems of persecution on these grounds.

Claimants from designated countries will face a bias against them even at the first level since decision-makers will be aware of the government's judgment on that country. There will be an overall presumption of safety in certain countries that will affect the process.

Some claims from countries that are generally seen not to be refugee producing are among those that most need appeal due to the difficult issues of fact and law, such as the availability of state protection. The denial of fair process to these claimants may lead to their forced return to persecution, a violation of human rights law.

The Canadian Council for Refugees says there are other concerns as well about designated countries of origin. It says:

Having a list of “safe countries of origin” politicizes the refugee system. There will be new diplomatic pressures from countries unhappy about not being considered “safe”.

As currently drafted, the amendment would give the minister a blank cheque to designate any country, part of a country or groups within a country without reference to the principles of refugee protection. Those are serious issues that have been raised by the Canadian Council for Refugees.

The council goes on to note that it has problems with the eight day interview and hearing process after 60 days. The government has proposed that claimants be interviewed by the Immigration and Refugee Board after eight days and that their hearing take place 60 days later. The council believes that eight days after arrival is too soon for a formal interview. The interview is used to take the claimant's detailed statement about his or her claim. It would be unfair to the most vulnerable claimants, such as those traumatized by experiences of torture or women unaccustomed to speaking to authority figures.

Some claimants are ready for a hearing after 60 days, but others are not, including refugees who need to build trust in order to be able to testify freely, such as persons who have experienced sexual assault. Other refugees need more than 60 days to gather relevant documentation to support their claim, especially those whose claim relates to a newly emerging pattern of persecution or those who are in detention.

Again, there are very serious concerns about holding hearings before claimants are ready to deal with that important part of the process.

The Canadian Council for Refugees also raises concerns about decision makers and who is making the decisions in this process. It notes that first-instance decision makers would be civil servants rather than cabinet appointees. Members of the refugee appeal division would be appointed by the cabinet.

It says that this does perhaps go in some way to dealing with problematic political appointments, but it also raises some concerns, noting that assigning refugee determination to civil servants is fundamentally problematic because they lack the necessary independence

It also notes that limiting appointments to civil servants will exclude some of the most highly qualified potential decisions makers, from a diverse range of backgrounds such as academia, human rights and social service. It believes that will affect the quality of decisions.

The question of appointments to the RAD remains unresolved. Under the bill they would be political appointments, which will affect the quality of decision making.

The CCR notes problems with the appeal and pre-removal risk assessment. It notes that the pre-removal risk assessment still exists but that it is an ineffective and inefficient system. Also it believes that, for some claimants, this will continue to be an issue because of its inefficiency requiring a whole second structure to do the same work as the immigration and refugee board, something that is not fully addressed in the bill.

The Canadian Council for Refugees is also concerned for the humanitarian and compassionate consideration provisions of the bill. The bill would bar refugee claimants from applying for humanitarian and compassionate consideration while their claim is in process and for 12 months afterwards.

Applicants for H and C consideration would also be barred from raising factors related to risks here and in the country of origin. The CCR believes that H and C consideration is necessary as a recourse to consider human rights issues including the best interests of children and potential risk to persons. Closing off this recourse may be contrary to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Those are some of the concerns raised by the Canadian Council for Refugees.

Amnesty International, another well-respected organization that has a key interest in refugee policies, also has very serious concerns about the safe country of origin list. It says that such lists constitute discrimination among refugees that is strictly prohibited by article 3 of the refugee convention. Article 3 of the United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees is about non-discrimination. It states:

The Contracting States shall apply the provisions of this Convention to refugees without discrimination as to race, religion or country of origin.

Amnesty International also notes in a statement on this new legislation:

...over the course of nearly fifty years of human rights research around the world we have consistently highlighted it is not possible to definitively characterize countries as safe or unsafe when it comes to human rights. We are very concerned that decisions about which countries to include on any such “safe country of origin” list will almost inevitably be influenced by considerations other than human rights, including trading relationships and security cooperation with other governments.

One of the other organizations that has taken a very key interest in this is the Canadian Bar Association. Its citizenship and immigration law section is very concerned about the bill and asked that it be subject to a referral before second reading so that the committee could deal with the very serious concerns that are raised in it.

Yesterday I met with a refugee activist in British Columbia who is also very concerned about this legislation. She was very concerned that safe countries do not necessarily mean that all the people of those countries are safe and that the legislation needs to talk about safe people. She was also concerned about the language around bogus claims and abuse of the system, which she thinks was not particularly helpful in all of this.

There are many concerns about this legislation. I hope we can have a very fulsome debate on it and one at committee as well. I would have preferred that we got there before second reading so it could be a really extensive debate at committee.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak in this debate on Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

The Conservatives, in their penchant for giving bills nicknames, have called this the “balanced refugee reform act”. I am hoping beyond hope that this will be the case with this legislation but there have been some serious concerns raised about the bill and I hope to speak to some of those.

Canada has always been a haven for refugees. We as a country have done very well by those refugees who have arrived here and made Canada their home. Whether it was the United Empire Loyalists at the time of the American revolution, Hungarians in 1956, people from the Unites States who resisted the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese boat people after the end of the Vietnam War, or people from the People's Republic of China after the events of Tiananmen Square, Canada has benefited greatly from these significant refugee movements. Those are just some of the movements of political refugees that have seen people come to Canada.

There have also been significant refugee movements fleeing economic problems and other social problems in their country of origin. We saw the Irish in the 19th century at the time of the potato famine. We saw Scottish emigration, eastern European emigration and emigration from Asia and Italy. In fact, my own family and probably many of our families came to Canada as economic migrants. All of these groups and many others have contributed greatly and continue to contribute greatly to building our country.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise here today to speak to Bill C-11.

I would like to begin by saying that the Bloc Québécois will support sending this bill to committee so it may be studied more thoroughly, along with all issues pertaining to immigration and refugees.

This bill raises a number of concerns. We have already pointed out several inconsistencies relating to refugee status.

I would like to talk about two people I know personally from my riding. A man and woman, now married, are refugees from Tanzania and they are still waiting for their children. They have been fighting to bring their children to Canada for five years. They were asked to submit to DNA testing. The UN even had to intervene to do a comparative study and ensure that these children really are the children of this refugee couple in Canada. Now that we have received the results, we hope things will speed up, but there are still some obstacles.

When the children of legitimate refugees in Canada spend five years in refugee camps, we have every right to wonder if the measures proposed by the minister are rigorous enough to ensure that refugee claims under the family reunification program are being assessed correctly.

A number of countries are considered safe. We have a major problem with this provision in the bill. Who can determine with certainty whether or not a country is safe? Apparently Mexico is considered a safe country. However, on the Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada website, Canadians travelling to Mexico are discouraged from visiting certain regions of the country because doing so would put their lives at risk.

If it is too dangerous for the lives of Canadians and Quebeckers, is it not too dangerous for the Mexicans living there? Why are Mexicans who want to be free from the shackles of the drug wars and power struggles throughout their country not allowed to claim refugee status? Are we perhaps underestimating the safe nature of that country?

Yesterday, a new government was elected in Hungary. At first glance, that country seems safe. The right wing government has two thirds of the seats. With that many seats, it can implement measures to advance its program without having to consult other political parties. Hungary may have been considered safe yesterday or today, but tomorrow human rights there might not be respected the same way and the situation might change.

The House has passed a bill on free trade with Colombia. And yet there is a call for greater respect for human rights in that country. If a Colombian citizen applied, could he be considered a refugee in Canada if we have a free trade agreement with his country? We have to wonder.

In Colombia, abortion is illegal and punishable by a prison sentence. In more than 70 countries around the world, homosexuality is illegal and even punishable by death in some countries. What would happen if people from those countries came here? We know what our Conservative colleagues think about homosexuality. In a country where homosexuality is legal and part of our daily lives, a minister who offered a subsidy for Toronto's gay pride parade was rebuked and put in her place.

Therefore, we have good reason to ask whether giving the minister the latitude to designate safe countries without consulting this House is an acceptable measure.

On the other hand, we are pleased that the minister wants to speed up the refugee claim process. However, we must not move too quickly and we must be careful. We all know that a refugee is often someone who has left their country in a hurry with nothing, without documents or money, and is truly destitute. When a person leaves their country with absolutely nothing, it takes a little more than eight days to obtain the necessary documents.

We might be able to do something, to make some changes to the bill so that the person's first appearance is scheduled more than eight days later. This would allow the person to obtain documents, think about what he wants to do, how to do it and better understand what is happening. The person would have the opportunity to consult the various organizations in the community that could help him.

It has also been noted that there are some changes in the bill with respect to the refugee appeal division and we are pleased that it is finally being implemented. In fact, the Bloc Québécois has introduced two bills to create and implement the refugee appeal division, even though it was contained in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that this House voted on. Neither bill was successful. One version even died after being adopted by the Senate. When it returned to the House, the bill died because, if I recall correctly, the House was closed for an election.

It is unfortunate because, since 2005, the number of people applying for refugee status has more than doubled, from 20,000 then to 60,000 today. That is truly a lot of people claiming refugee status.

On the weekend, I got a call from a psychologist who works with victims of rape, incest and sexual abuse. She told me about a woman who had been imprisoned last week because she claimed refugee status and was not believed. This woman is from Guinea, where customary marriages are still common. She was married at a very young age to a much older man, who abused her sexually and physically. She had very obvious signs of torture on her body, and even a scar from an iron on her breast. The hospital here in Canada was able to determine that this woman really had been abused.

This woman claimed refugee status, and after having lived in Canada for some time, she met a man from her country of origin, fell in love with him and married him. After getting married, she pursued her claim for refugee status, but she was told that her marriage with this man was not genuine and she was accused of fraud. She was told that she had only married this man to obtain refugee status and sponsorship, although they had been legally married in front of the entire community. They are together, they are married, and they are now expecting a child.

Last year, at the beginning of the economic crisis, the Minister of Labour said that if there was no work in Quebec and the Atlantic provinces, workers should go out west, where there is work. This woman's husband listened to the minister and went out west to support his family. The couple was then told that their marriage was not genuine because he went to work out west to support his family. That is unbelievable.

Last week, this 42-year-old woman, who has type 2 diabetes, was put in jail. She is now at the immigration detention centre in Laval. On April 28, she is going to be sent back to her country, where nobody will take care of her or her soon-to-be-born baby. Yet this very day, G8 ministers are in Halifax talking about maternal and child health, and the Prime Minister wants to introduce a maternal and child health initiative.

We cannot even take care of people here who are suffering and who could die if they return to their home countries because they will not receive adequate care. They could die. In Guinea, there are no doctors to provide the care that this woman will need until she gives birth because she has type 2 diabetes and is obese.

In reviewing the immigration system, we have to begin by making sure that public officials and judges have solid reasons for turning down applications from all individuals who have legitimate claims.

People have all kinds of reasons for wanting to stay here. A claimant might be a man who just wants to support his family. In contrast, a claimant might be a woman who says that she was forced to marry and will be found guilty by her ex-husband's family if she goes back to her home country. In these countries, women are held responsible if their husbands die. They can be charged and may suffer greatly.

How can we justify sending people back to countries like those whose values differ so dramatically from our own? Why would we support women in developing countries and save their lives when we do not support women and save their lives when they come here to ask for our help? I would really like to know. I am really confused about this, and I would like an answer to that question very soon.

I hope that this woman will be allowed to stay here. I hope she will not be sent away before her baby is born. It would be inhumane to send a woman in such a high-risk situation back to her country.

The refugee appeal division should have been implemented earlier so that this women could really appeal the decision made against her. Unfortunately, we are told that the refugee appeal division will come into effect by 2013 or 2014. That is three years from now, three long years for people who are suffering and wondering whether their claim will be heard. I hold out very little hope that this will happen.

I have often heard the minister talk to refugee, immigrant and other groups, and I believe he tells the truth. But I would like that honesty to extend to the measures he introduces.

I know that it is not as easy for a party to be in government as in opposition, because it has to take budgets and other factors into account. But the government members also have to consider what their colleagues are saying and calling for.

I hope this minister will do what he needs to do to ensure that all genuine refugee claimants can obtain refugee status. Too many people around the world are suffering. Moreover, we signed the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, which means that we must not take refugee claimants' sexual orientation or country of origin into consideration, or what they are or what they do.

All we must consider is what they need.

We will support Bill C-11 so that it goes to committee and we can suggest amendments and correct measures that we feel are slightly random, unjustified or unjustifiable. I hope that everyone who is watching today will support what the Bloc Québécois is doing so that all refugee claimants can obtain refugee status.

In conclusion, the men and women who sit in the House have ideals and values similar to our own in some areas. I am certain that we will make the right decisions. We will do everything we can to ensure that the parts of the bill that we are not happy with are amended. Otherwise, the bill will not meet our expectations or refugee claimants' needs.

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, Vaughan, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is critical that we examine the legislation before us and ensure that the refugee system reform measures will fix the refugee system challenges our country faces. Let us put the system into its proper context.

Today we have a backlog of 63,000 refugee claims. People in genuine need of protection wait about 19 months for processing claims. We have witnessed the drastic 50% decrease in the number of finalized claims and an almost 50% increase in the cost to finalize a single claim. The estimated cost to taxpayers is approximately $29,000 for processing each claimant.

There was a delay by the Conservative government in filling vacancies at the Immigration and Refugee Board which negatively affected the performance of the board. The minister's 2009-10 report on planning and priorities states that the shortfall in decision makers has contributed to the growth of the pending case inventory and to increased average of processing times. In addition, the Auditor General, in the March 2009 report of the Auditor General of Canada, chapter two, asserts her concern for the need to timely and efficiently appoint and reappoint decision makers to the IRB.

These facts and others made the case for comprehensive refugee reform very obvious and an absolute priority. Although reform of the refugee system is needed, we must ensure that it is fair, efficient and just. While the reform package incorporates some Liberal recommendations such as the refugee appeal division, we have to do due diligence on the bill. After all, there are concerns about what has occurred in the past four years, such as slow processing times and longer wait periods for persons claiming refugee status so, caution is in fact warranted.

Therefore, before any refugee reform legislation is implemented, we will ensure that it meets our standards of procedural fairness, that it is just, fast and efficient and that it does not undermine the trust many people place in our system. Obviously, as the minister alluded to, Canadians cannot afford further poorly implemented band-aid solutions like the imposition of visas on individuals from countries such as Mexico and the Czech Republic as happened last summer. This is the reason we will seek assurances that this reform package is going to meet the highest standard of public policy-making.

In 2004, the former Liberal government implemented changes to the appointment process for the Immigration and Refugee Board. Changes included an advisory panel made up of lawyers, academics and others involved in the refugee process which screened all applicants for the IRB. When the present government came to power, unfortunately it delayed appointments. Everyone knows the result of that has been a ballooning refugee backlog. This is what the bill is also trying to address.

In addition to the growing backlog of applications, there has been concern expressed about the integrity of our system. As I said earlier, recent spikes in claims from certain countries have resulted in an ad hoc use of visa restriction to constrict application volumes. As mentioned earlier, significant examples of this occurred last summer when in response to a spike in claims from Mexico and the Czech Republic, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration imposed visa restrictions on both countries. When we impose visa restrictions, we can jeopardize or strain relationships with countries, in the case of Mexico with one of our North American economic partners. In the case of the Czech Republic, there were also bad feelings created in the European Union as a result.

The government's justification for the bill is focused on streamlining the system to deal with the growing application backlog, providing further flexibility to the minister to deal with the unusual spikes in refugee claims from democratic source countries and streamlining the removal process for unsuccessful applicants.

The bill proposes changes to almost every stage of the in-Canada process. Currently, people with successful claims are waiting an average of 19 months for a decision and it takes an average of four or five years to process and remove an unsuccessful claimant.

Information is currently gathered within 28 days through a personal information form. Under this bill, personal information would be gathered within eight days of a claim through an interview process. It is hoped that this will avoid delays related to incomplete forms and late paperwork. However, there have been significant concerns that this timeline is unrealistic and will result in claimants being unable to get appropriate counsel.

Possible changes around timelines and appropriate legal aid protection should be considered. We cannot afford to have a system where legal counsel is effectively denied and where a poor decision will lead perhaps to a number of time-consuming adjournments.

In the current system, a first-level decision is made by a governor in council appointee within about 18 months. Under the new process, the first-level decision would be made by an IRB public servant within about 60 days. Other countries that have public servant first-level decision makers tend to have higher rates of successful appeals. This can make the process less efficient overall and undermine trust in the refugee determination system.

For instance, the UNHCR has expressed concerns that administrative decision makers in the United Kingdom are inadequately trained and are not producing quality credibility assessments at hearings. Although CIC officials claim that the decision makers in the new system would be senior level and would be highly trained, there is no guarantee of that in this package. The fact that decision makers are housed in the independent IRB may alleviate some concerns regarding their independence, but close assessment of their qualifications, training and hiring processes will be required.

Concerns have also been raised about the 60 day timeline, whether it is realistic and whether it will limit a claimant's ability to obtain representation and compile a proper case within this timeline. Review of these timelines and possible further legal aid support will be required.

There is currently no appeal within the IRB and review is left to the Federal Court. It should be noted that the concept of a refugee appeals division was part of the initial Liberal plan for the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

The bill would create a new refugee appeals division, RAD, staffed by governor in council appointees to review negative first-level decisions. The target for the appeal process in this case would be within four months. Most of the appeals would be paper based, but there would be an opportunity for an oral hearing and the introduction of new evidence that was not available at the time of the first hearing.

In the United Kingdom, 89% of the initial 2007 decisions were appealed and 23% of those initial refusals were overturned. This has led to a huge court backlog of 450,000 cases as of 2008 in the United Kingdom, which may take between 10 to 18 years to resolve. By comparison, in Canada only 1% of asylum appeals are currently successful.

Guidelines are expected to clearly set out when an oral hearing is necessary and when an appeal should proceed in writing. The adjudicator's decision to proceed in writing or not would create an additional administrative decision that could be appealed to the Federal Court.

The primary concern about the introduction of the RAD would be to ensure that the first-level decision is conducted in a way that protects procedural fairness and fundamental justice sufficiently to avoid the RAD becoming another bottleneck in the process.

The system does not currently include a designated country of origin list. The bill would provide the minister with discretion to create designated countries of origin. This is one of the most contentious proposed changes.

The UNHCR has already expressed concern that any such process must take into account the gender and sexual orientation persecution issues in many democratic countries. This may also create diplomatic problems as countries lobby to be put on the list or may be insulted that they have been left off.

UNHCR has previously indicated that safe country of origin practices are acceptable as a procedural tool provided we have safeguards in place. The bill would remove access to the RAD for individuals from designated countries of origin. However, claimants can still have a negative decision reviewed by the Federal Court.

There are still unanswered questions about the process for adding countries to the designated country of origin list. Although we have been assured that this will be used as a last resort to avoid the imposition of visas in countries in good human rights records, issues of fairness and fundamental justice will have to be addressed.

Legal experts are pointing to a major difference between Canada's proposed legislation and that of European countries. The word “safe” does not appear anywhere in the relevant section of Bill C-11. This omission, they say, places too much legal discretion in the hands of the minister and raises serious questions about the law's potential use. It may be appropriate to look at the process by which countries are designated and incorporates some level of independence for selection or parliamentary oversight through amendments.

Currently a claimant has access to multiple appeal processes, including the Federal Court, after each additional rejection. The bill would restrict access to other avenues of appeal for one year following the last negative decision. That means that once the IRB, or RAD, if triggered, has rendered its decision, post decision processes will be barred for one year to allow for removal within that year. Applicants would retain the ability to appeal to the Federal Court. For the information of members, barred avenues include pre-removal risk assessment, section 25, a humanitarian and compassionate grounds application, applications for temporary residence and administrative deferrals of removal.

There would also be a ban on concurrent applications under the refugee protection system and under section 25 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. Prior to the first level decision, applicants in the refugee system would be required to select which stream they would like to pursue. Unsuccessful refugee applicants would be banned from section 25 applications for one year from their final IRB determination. After one year from the final IRB decision, the section 25 avenue would again be reopened or open to the applicant. Any time bars to accessing pre-removal assessment or humanitarian and compassionate applications would still need to be reasonable and procedurally fair, as the life, freedom and security of the applicant could be at stake pending the outcome of these decisions.

The humanitarian and compassionate review process operates as an avenue of last resort for persons who do not fit into any of the categories in IRPA to appeal directly to the minister. Limiting access to humanitarian and compassionate grounds could lead to people being deported in the face of humanitarian injustices and safeguards. This will require close review. This issue will require further study to assess the practicality of closing all these avenues of recourse.

The reform package proposes $540.7 million over five years and $85.4 million in ongoing funding. The $540 million is broken down into $324 million over five years for the development of the new refugee system, $126 million to address the backlog and $90 over five years to increase the number of refugees resettled from abroad.

The concern we have, and I have stated this to the minister, is that these funds were not set out in budget 2010 and the Conservatives told us program spending was frozen for the next several years. The minister has stated that these funds are in the fiscal framework, so it will have to be determined what will be cut to take into account these new expenditures. For instance, according to budget 2010, CBSA was actually identified as a source of savings of $54 million in 2011 and $58.4 million in 2012-13 through streamlining and cuts, but had been allocated $142 million in new money under this plan. Questions about transparency and accountability of funding are of concern. We want to ensure that the investment Canadian taxpayers make actually goes where it is supposed to go.

There has been a wide variety of reaction to the tabling of Bill C-11 and even prior to the introduction of the bill. For example, the UN High Commissioner was concerned prior to the introduction of the bill about the countries of origin idea. He stated that the new measures must recognize such things as “sexual preference”, are “grounds for persecution even in democracies”. He also noted other potential issues about gender.

Another individual, Professor Peter Showler, notes that the requirement that the first hearing take place within 60 days after a very quick interview is too quick and impractical. It is impractical in the sense that the refugee will not be able to find a lawyer, inform the lawyer, let the lawyer gather the evidence and present that evidence at the hearing. If that first hearing is not a good hearing, the entire system will unravel fairly quickly. He suggests that 120 days would be a more realistic time frame.

Lastly, the Canadian Council of Refugees does not agree with any of the major changes in the bill, stating that the introduction of a list of “safe countries of origin” is a mistake and has basically criticized the entire approach.

The Liberal Party and the Auditor General of Canada have noted the need to reform the refugee system for a while now. We must address some of the flaws that I have stated, however, there are some positive steps in this bill regarding needed refugee reform.

We must examine the effectiveness and fairness of the timelines for the first decisions so that they are realistic and ensure that the refugees are adequately represented. Refugees may face logistical challenges in acquiring the necessary materials to support their cases due to poor infrastructure in source countries or translation requirements. We must ensure the fundamental justice of vulnerable people involved in the system and ensure a flawed first-level process does not result in a backed up system at the appeal level, like they are struggling with in other jurisdictions such as the United Kingdom. It is important that we ensure that all claimants have equal and fair access to the appropriate legal representation.

In the case of the quality of first level decision-makers, it is important that the government provide more specific details about the independence and qualification of the proposed first line decision-makers.

Clause 12 of Bill C-11 would give the minister the authority to designate a country, or part of a country, or class of nationals of a country, according to criteria to be established by regulation. Persons from designated areas of classes may not appeal negative refugee protection decisions to the Refugee Appeal Division. Nor may the minister appeal cases involving these people. Instead applicants and the minister would need to seek leave to appeal the first level decision from the federal court. The designated authority of origin clause may be problematic in its design, as it may present concerns of transparency and accountability.

Several lawyers and academics have raised concerns about the specific wording of the provision in Bill C-11, which refers to “designated countries of origin” rather than “safe countries of origin”. They argue that the current wording provides the minister with too much discretion in designating countries and that it is susceptible to politicization.

Bill C-11 would make several changes to the humanitarian and compassionate grounds for foreign nationals in Canada. For instance, according to subclause 4(1), the minister may not examine requests to remaining Canada's permanent residents on humanitarian and compassionate grounds if less than 12 months have passed since the final negative IRB decision.

It is obvious that we have presented a credible case for changes to a number of elements of Bill C-11. As Canadians, we take pride in the fact that our country offers a safe haven to so many who are victims of fear, discrimination or persecution in their home countries. Throughout this parliamentary debate, our focus must be on creating the best possible refugee system.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

moved that Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise here today to speak to Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act.

This bill and related reforms would reinforce Canada's humanitarian tradition as a place of refuge for victims of persecution and torture, while improving our asylum system to ensure that it is balanced, fast and fair. The bill would ensure faster protection of bona fide refugees, reinforce procedural fairness by implementing a robust refugee appeals division at the IRB and ensure faster removal of those who seek to abuse Canada's generosity by making asylum claims.

Canada has always been a place of refuge for victims of persecution, warfare and oppression. English Canada was founded by refugees fleeing the American revolution, the United Empire Loyalists. Canada was the north star of the underground railroad for escaped slaves from the southern United States.

In 1956, Canada welcomed some 40,000 refugees of Soviet communism fleeing the invasion of Budapest. In 1979 and 1980, Canadian churches and families welcomed some 50,000 Vietnamese or Indochinese boat people, creating the magnificent foundations of our privately sponsored refugee program.

Having said that, there have been moments when we turned our backs on those most urgently in need of our help. We think, of course, of the example of the European Jewish refugees during the second world war who Canada refused to accept, detailed in the great historical work None is Too Many written by Harold Troper and Irving Abella.

We must learn from the mistakes of that period so that we never repeat them. I believe we have learned from those mistakes, because Canada has welcomed some one million refugees to make a new start here in Canada in security and with our protection since the second world war.

There remain an estimated 10.5 million refugees, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, around the world. Every year, some 20 developed democracies resettle about 100,000 refugees, and from that number Canada annually resettles between 10,000 and 12,000 or 1 out of every 10 refugees resettled globally, second only to the United States with 10 times our population.

The government is also active with our international partners to help those in need. Take, for example, the government's commitment to resettle up to 5,000 Bhutanese refugees from Nepal over several years. We have already welcomed more than 850 Bhutanese refugees in several communities across Canada. In addition, we have also completed the resettlement of more than 3,900 Karens from Thailand.

I was very proud last year to announce a special program to welcome to Canada over the course of three years some 12,000 refugees from the conflict in Iraq. I visited some of these families in Damascus, Syria, last May and I must say I still remain touched and deeply moved after hearing their stories of violence and persecution, often on religious grounds.

Everywhere I go across the country, I encourage community groups, church groups, faith groups and others to participate in our privately-sponsored refugee program to help rescue those Iraqi refugees and other people in need of our support around the world.

In addition to all those things, we have increased our support for the UNHCR in its important work to help displaced populations on the ground. In fact, to quote Abraham Abraham, the UNHCR representative to Canada, “Canada, a major settlement country and a major donor to UNHCR activities worldwide, has for the time in its funding of UNHCR's global operations worldwide reached a new level of over $51 million, making this the highest ever annual Canadian grant to the UN refugee agency”.

I am proud that happened under this government.

In spite of our many achievements, I believe that in the context of balanced reform to our refugee system, Canada can and should do more to help those in need of our protection. That is why, as part of this broader package of reform to our refugee systems, including our asylum system, I have announced our intention to increase the number of resettled refugees welcomed to Canada by 2,500 individuals, to 14,000. We would continue to lead the world and set an example for other countries.

I propose, in the context of refugee reform, that we increase by some 20% or $9 million the refugee assistance program to provide initial assistance for the successful integration of government-assisted refugees typically coming from UN camps. I have also announced, as part of these increases and targets, an increase of some 2,000 positions for people to come through the very effective, privately sponsored refugee program.

Bizarrely, these huge increases in Canada's generosity that I announced were criticized by one individual claiming to speak on behalf of refugee organizations, demonstrating that there are some in this debate who are neither objective nor balanced in their approach. However, I must say that I was gratified to see the overwhelmingly positive response from those who actually work with refugees, not just issue press releases but actually do the practical work with people who need a new start.

For example, Mr. Abraham of the UNHCR said, “This is an encouraging move in the right direction that yet again demonstrates the humanitarian commitment of Canada to provide protection to needy refugees for whom resettlement is the only solution enabling them to rebuild their shattered lives with respect and dignity”.

Mr. Tsehai of Canadian Lutheran World Relief expressed his “sincere appreciation and deep gratitude for your announcement to increase the PSR target to a 6,500 annual level”.

A coalition of sponsorship agreement holders, groups that bring the refugees to Canada, said they were “thrilled with the news”.

There can be no doubt that this government is committed to continuing Canada's proud humanitarian tradition of protecting those in need, but let me turn my attention to the asylum system.

We also have, as all members will know, a very robust, highly regarded and extraordinarily fair charter-compliant legal system for the consideration of asylum claims made by refugee claimants arriving in Canada. Unfortunately the system has many serious, longstanding problems and everyone knows it.

I would like to credit the member for Vaughan, the official opposition immigration critic, for having raised this issue as early as 18 months ago and doing so in a non-partisan fashion. I would also like to commend the Leader of the Opposition for having pointed to the problems in our asylum system, which must be addressed.

One of the problems is that we have had long, very large backlogs in asylum claims as a permanent feature of the system. The average size of the asylum backlog in our system over the past 10 or 15 years has been 40,000 people waiting for a hearing on their applications for asylum protection in Canada. That means that, typically, people have been waiting about a year to get even a hearing. Right now the backlog is as high as 60,000 people waiting for a decision or a hearing on their applications, meaning that people have to wait 19 months for a hearing. This is not acceptable. We must do better.

If someone manages to escape one of Ahmadinejad's prisons in Iran and he arrives at one of our airports with the scars of torture fresh on his back, we do not offer him a quick pathway to security and protection in Canada. We give him a form and say we will check back with him in 19 months.

That is not good enough. Frankly, those who defend the status quo, who say that these permanent, huge backlogs and the large number of false claims, which contribute enormously to those backlogs, are acceptable, have taken the wrong position with respect to our moral obligation to provide speedy protection to those in need of it.

The truth is this. Too many people try to use our asylum system as a back door to gain entry into Canada, rather than wait patiently to come here through the immigration process. The result is that too many people abuse our system in an effort to jump the immigration queue. There are a number of problems with the current system, which encourage unfounded claims.

How do I make this assessment that there are many unfounded claims? In the last two years, we have seen that some 58% of the claims for asylum made in Canada were subsequently deemed to be unfounded or not in need of our protection. Many of those claims are actually withdrawn by the claimants. I will give one example.

I suspect if we went to any of our constituencies and asked people what they think is the most likely source of refugee claims in Canada, they might say Iran, North Korea, Somalia or Iraq. In point of fact, it is an EU democracy, Hungary. Last year, there were 2,500 claims. Subsequently, 97% of claimants from that European democracy went on to withdraw or abandon their own claims, indicating to us that they do not need our protection. Why they came and went through the asylum system is a good question. A clue may be found in a criminal investigation into allegations of human trafficking involving many of these claimants who are being victimized, allegedly, by a human trafficking ring.

However, of the 2,500 claims made from that EU democracy, only 3 claims were found to be in need of our protection. Therefore, with six out of ten claims being made, which were subsequently found not to be in need of Canada's protection, and with Canada receiving one of the highest levels of asylum claims in the world with a 60% increase in the number of claims filed between 2006 and 2008, all of this to me indicates that Canada has become, regrettably, a country of choice for those who seek to migrate, not through the normal legal system, but by inventing claims often facilitated by unscrupulous agents and third parties in the immigration industry.

These problems are serious. Even the Auditor General has pointed to the backlogs creating this pull factor for false claims. What we seek to do in these reforms is to create and reinforce balance that respects our obligation to provide due process that is compliant with the charter and with the United Nations conventions on torture and refugees to asylum claimants, balance that does not restrict access to the asylum system for those who believe they have a need for our protection but balance that will provide faster protection decisions for legitimate refugees while providing faster removals for the many who actually come here seeking to abuse Canada's generosity.

How do we propose to do that? First, there would be an initial information gathering interview that would provide earlier contact with an officer from the IRB than claimants now have. Although these officers would not decide on claims, they would be able to identify claims that appear well founded and could recommend expedited processing for them. What this means for people who have managed to escape persecution is that they would not have to wait a year and a half for protection but could receive it in a matter of weeks.

I understand that some claimants may be too traumatized to explain what prompted their claim. That is why during an interview if the officer determines that a claimant is in this situation, he or she could have the discretion to postpone the interview until the claimant could receive the appropriate guidance and support.

The information that officers would gather, coupled with solid facts about the nature of their claim, would lead to hearings at the refugee protection division, staffed by a highly trained, independent public servant, within 60 days. In cases where there is a good reason for delay, there would be that flexibility, but an information gathering interview within eight days and a hearing at the IRB within sixty days would be the norm.

The proposed new system would also include, and this is very important, a full appeal for most claimants. Unlike the appeal process proposed in the past and the one dormant in our current legislation, this refugee appeal division, or RAD, would allow for the introduction of new evidence and, in certain circumstances, provide for an oral hearing.

By the way, that is responding to a demand from some of the opposition parties for a very long time. I should point out that when the Liberal government was in office, three subsequent immigration ministers and the government took the position that they could not implement the RAD until there was a streamlining of the overall asylum system. We are now providing that streamlining. It is time to say yes to the appeal division in the context of a more efficient but still fair system.

I will now turn my attention to one of the more contentious aspects of the legislation, which would be to allow for the designation of certain countries as being safe. The nationals from those countries, under these reforms, would still, and I emphasize still, have the same access they currently do to our asylum system. They would still have access to an appeal by our independent judiciary at the Federal Court. They would still have access to a fully charter compliant process that actually exceeds our international obligations but the consideration of those unfounded claims from designated safe countries would move somewhat more expeditiously, reducing the process by about four months by not allowing them to make two appeals, the first one being to the refugee appeal division.

Someone said that this is unfair or inappropriate. No less authority than the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, said here in Ottawa on March 24, “there are indeed safe countries of origin. There are indeed countries in which there is a presumption that refugee claims will probably be not as strong as in other countries”.

He went on to say that we could not deny access to the initial hearing, which we do not in our proposed reforms, and that it was important to have a fair and transparent process for designating these countries, as do most western European asylum systems whose example we are emulating in these reforms.

I wan to be absolutely clear that the proposition is not to create a comprehensive list of all countries designated as safe or unsafe. To the contrary. The criteria would be the following. A country would need to be designated as safe. We propose that this designation process would be in the hands of a panel of senior public servants who would make consultations with UNHCR and would refer to independent human rights supports by NGOs. The criteria would be: if a country is a principal source of asylum claims to Canada, the overwhelming majority of which are unfounded; and if such a country is a signatory to and in compliance with international human rights instruments, which has a strong human rights record and which offers state protection to its citizens, including vulnerable individuals.

Why do we need this? The reason is that periodically we see huge spikes in unfounded claims from democratic countries. Twenty-five years ago it was Portugal, not under a dictatorship, but a social democratic government. Thousands of claims were received and almost all of them were found to be false. What did Canada do? It imposed a visa.

In 2000, it was Chile, not under Pinochet, but a social democratic government, the most stable and prosperous democracy in South America. We received thousands of claims and almost all of them were found not to be in need of Canada's protection. How did we respond? We imposed a visa on Chile. In 2003 and 2004, it was Costa Rica, the most stable and prosperous democracy in Central America. We received thousands of claims and almost all of them were found to be not in need of our protection. Canada imposed a visa. In 1997, it was Hungary and Czechoslovakia. Thousands of claims were received and almost all were unfounded. We imposed a visa. Now I mention the situation with respect to Hungary.

When we see these spikes, it is important to understand that these are not just happening spontaneously. We have solid reason to believe that behind these waves of unfounded claims from democratic countries, there are often networks encouraging, facilitating, advising people, commercial networks, the bottom feeders in the immigration industry or sometimes there is evidence of even criminal networks.

All we are saying is that we need a tool other than the imposition of visas to address those spikes in unfounded claims. I appreciate the support and agreement of the Leader of the Opposition in this respect. Last August, in Saint John, New Brunswick, he said, “I want a legitimate, lawful refugee system that to get to the openness point welcomes genuine refugees”. He then said, Look, there are a number of countries in the world in which we cannot accept a bona fide refugee claim because you do not have cause, you do not have just cause coming from those countries. It is rough and ready but otherwise we will have refugee fraud and nobody wants that, including bona fide refugees”.

The Leader of the Opposition may have gone a little bit too far in suggesting that we deny access to the asylum system to claimants from safe countries, but his general concept is entirely sensible and has been endorsed by virtually every newspaper in the country, for example, that has editorialized on this matter.

As I said, these reforms have been broadly endorsed. Eighty-four percent of Canadians say that the government should take steps to reform the refugee determination system,. Eighty-one percent of Canadians agree that refugee claims should be dealt with more quickly so that genuine refugees can settle in Canada faster and bogus claimants can be sent home more quick. By a margin of four to one, Canadians agree that more needs to be done to quickly remove from Canada people whose refugee claims are unfounded and rejected.

The Toronto Star has said, “the government deserves credit for showing the political will to act on an issue ducked by many of our predecessors”. The Globe and Mail says, “Canada has a crying need for a revamped refugee determination system”. The Montreal Gazette says, ”these reforms are a solid and a sensible attempt to reform the system”. Peter Schowler, former IRB chairman and head of the refugee think-tank at the University of Ottawa says, “the Conservative government has managed to propose a system that is both fast and fair, striking a reasonable balance between the two”. The Canadian Lawyer Magazine says, ”the lawyers in the immigration field probably support these reforms”.

These are balanced, reasonable reforms that I believe all members in all parties can support. I will be open to reasonable amendments that achieve the objective of a fast and fair system when this bill gets to committee. I hope that on this urgent issue we will all put aside partisan politics to some degree to allow our humanitarian tradition to prevail so that we can improve and protect the important humanitarian tradition of providing protection to those in need of it.

Business of the House

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, as my hon. colleague has indicated, I know we have some visitors who we are looking forward to seeing in the chamber shortly, so I will keep this brief as well.

When we get to government orders, following the visit, I will call Bill C-4, Sébastien's law, which proposes to protect the public from violent young offenders. Following Bill C-4, we will call Bill C-13, fairness for military families.

We will continue with that business tomorrow.

Next week it would be my intention to begin second reading debate on Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform act, Bill C-10, Senate term limits and Bill C-12, democratic representation.

Next Wednesday, April 28, shall be an allotted day.

As for the take note debate, that is under advisement.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Chair, would you entertain the motion that upon completion of the wait times study, we study the visitors visa issue; however, if Bill C-11, the refugee reform bill arrives to committee, it would take precedence?

Do you want to entertain that, or do you want to have it back to the committee so that we could spend more time at the subcommittee and study...?

What would you prefer? I just think it's cleaner.

Balanced Refugee Reform Act

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)